A lot of people say that fall (or autumn) is their favorite season. And what’s not to love about fall? Cooler temperatures, leaves changing colors, wearing your favorite sweatshirt and decorating in warm fall colors.
 
Here in the midwest of the US most days are beautiful days with crisp mornings and lazy, warm afternoons just right for apple picking, a picnic, visiting a pumpkin patch or snuggling under a quilt with a good book.
 
Speaking of quilts, I’ve been eyeing gingham quilts for a while now and decided to use pretty fall colors for this popular plaid quilt design. This is an easy quilt to assemble and definitely beginner-friendly. The only thing you have to keep in mind (as always with quilting) is to be precise in your measurements. You want your seams to line up at all the corners of the squares.

For the top of the quilt I used Robert Kaufman’s Kona cotton Mango (orange), Peach (light orange) and Snow (white). To assemble the quilt, I had two basic rows: row 1 alternated the Mango and Peach squares and Row 2 alternated Peach and Snow squares. I alternated rows 1 and 2 until I had the desired size for the quilt. 

I wanted a floral fabric for the backing and decided to use August Wren’s Moody Birds from the fabric collection Falling For You for Dear Stella. This pretty multi colored fabric combines flowers and birds in shades of red, orange, yellow, brown and even some pink.

I decided on a diagonal cross-hatch quilting motif for the quilt to keep it simple. Usually I’ll use quilting thread that matches the lightest color in the top fabric. This time however I used an orange thread that matched the Mango fabric.

For the binding I used a simple black and white striped fabric from Timeless Treasures. This gave the quilt a fresh, modern look.

Dimensions:  approximately 50 inches x 57inches (127cm x 145cm) - throw size

I have fond memories of stargazing with my dad as a child - from Halley’s comet to meteor showers to the Milky Way as well as the different constellations. Maybe that’s why the Stargazer Quilt reminds me so much of warm summer nights. Not humid and muggy summer nights like we get here in Missouri, but warm, breezy nights where you can sit outside and gaze up at the stars.
 
Or maybe it’s this beautiful fabric collection called Breeze, by Zen Chic for Moda fabrics that reminds me of a breezy summer’s day (or night). Different shades of blue, coral and white with small and medium scale geometrics, plus signs, alphabet letters as well as sashiko stitching motifs shine as stars in this quilt.

In the quilting world you get a variety of star patterns. For the stars in this quilt I chose the Sawtooth star which is one of the classic star blocks and one of my favorites to make. It consists of a large square in the middle, triangles made into flying geese blocks on all four sides and smaller squares at the corners. This placement forms a so-called eight-point star.

Once finished the size of one star measures 8 square inches (20.3 square cm). I used Robert Kaufman’s Kona cotton solid Pfd bleached white for the background of the star and on two sides of the stars to finish the block. By rotating the blocks I got what I call a floating star effect.

After I finished the quilt top and layered the quilt, I decided to quilt horizontal wavy lines 2 inches apart all over. The wavy-line quilting added to the feeling of stars floating. I used the light blue with navy pluses fabric for the backing.

For the binding I used Fire Lines in cornflower from the Breeze collection which combines the blues and coral.

The end result is a delightful lap size quilt with an airy feel to it.
 
Dimensions: 47 x 59 inches (119.5 x 150 cm) -  lap size
 
*** This quilt is now available for purchase in my Etsy shop. You can find it by going to the Shop tab on this website or here.

One of the first signs of spring in our area is when the daffodils start blooming. After a long, cold and oftentimes dreary winter, their bright yellow flowers are truly a welcome sight! I’ve finished this quilt with it’s pretty daffodil-like blocks just in time to celebrate the arrival of spring.

I love using Robert Kaufman’s Kona cotton solid fabrics, so for the top of the quilt I chose Kona cotton Bleach White PFD for the background and Kona cotton Mustard for the “flowers”.

For the backing, I used Poppie Cotton’s Meadow in white and for the binding, Seedlings in white from their Wanderings fabric collection. I am in love with this collection, it just speaks to my heart everytime I look at it.

The daffodil block is a variation of the square-in-a-square block, also called diamond-in-a-square or Amish Diamond block. This is a simple block which combines squares and triangles.

I arranged the blocks on point - which means the blocks were positioned in diagonal rows instead of vertical and horizontal rows. It changed the look of the quilt completely - from ordinary to stylish. Continuing the diagonal theme, I machine-quilted diagonal parallel lines an inch apart.

The backing of the quilt has a pretty floral design with yellows, blues, pinks and greens. The binding I hand-stitched to the quilt.

This is the perfect size quilt to snuggle under with a great book!
 
Dimensions: 70” x 52” (throw size)