Bricks
and Stepping-Stones!
(What to do when the bins of
2"
and 3.5" scrap strips are overflowing!)
Size: 60"X75"
This is a really great quilt to make when you need one in a hurry! The
large size of the bricks makes them a good place to use up those
'bigger' prints that are too big for smaller blocks. The black and
white four patches really add alot of spark and motion to the muted
background of the medium to dark prints. The only rule when choosing
fabrics for this quilt is to have all the bricks darker than your
lights in the four patches.....and the only place where there is BLACK
is in the fourpatches. No black bricks, or the four patches would
disappear against them. The object here isn't about color, it's about
contrast!
Cutting the bricks:
you will need 112 bricks cut 3.5" X 6.5"
To make the 4 patches:
For
the lap size quilt shown, you
will need to make 112 4 patches from 2" strips.
You can dig through your 2" bin of scrap strips for
all the
lights and all the blacks as I did, or you can go to your Fat Quarters
or Yardage to cut 2" strips to strip piece them. Because I made mine
from various strip lengths, no exact strip count is given. However, if
you are cutting them from full 44" yardage, you will need approx 12
strips of light, and 12 strips of black. You might end up with a few
extra four patches because I based this measurment on 40" wide fabric
after washing, ironing, and trimming (and room for a few mis-cuts!)
When I am subcutting for my 4 patch units, I like to take the strip
with the seam pressed towards the dark, and cut it in HALF along the
fold. Then I flip one of the half strips over so that the seams are
opposing! This helps distribute the fullness of the seams when cutting,
but it also makes it so you can just feed those little subcut pairs
through the machine already matched up into their four patch units :c)
Now for the fun part!
This is where you stack up your bricks to the left, and your 4 patches
to the right!
You will want to be sure all the 4 patches have the blacks running in
the same way shown here.
I call this unit "sewing the matchstick!"
Sew all 112 4 patches to all 112 bricks in this manner.
Press the seam allowance towards the bricks when you are done.
This is your block unit! It is NOT a square, it is a rectangle made of
two 'matchstick' units which finish at 6" X 9".
Take your stack of matchsticks, and divide it in half, flipping one
half the other way. Lay them out as shown, one pile with the four patch
at the top, and one pile with the four patch at the bottom. Sew these
right sides together, and press towards one side. The only thing I
watch for here is that I am not sewing two blues together, or two reds
together, etc...otherwise, it is completely random!
Now for playing on the floor time :c)
Following the quilt layout above, lay your brick blocks 8 across and 7
down. I know that sounds funny, but remember they are longer than they
are wide.
Stitch the bricks into rows, and then sew the rows together to complete
the quilt top.
I finished my quilt by adding a 2" cut inner border of black, and a 5"
cut outter border of blue/black check. I backed it with flannel and
quilted it to death!
If you make this quilt and
want to send me a pic, I'll be happy to
include it in the quilt photo gallery!
Questions
or Comments? I would love to hear from you!!
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