Checkered Garden Quilt - Warm & Spicy

This quilt has been living on my bed ever since I finished it. It is easily in my top five favourite quilts that I have ever made. It was completely sewn from fabrics in my stash, using Ashley's free tutorial. You may remember it from this post and this post?  

The pattern is wonderfully easy, with clever use of strip piecing to make construction faster than you would expect from a design with so many pieces.  The fact that the blocks are fourteen inches finished, means you will have a sizeable quilt in less time (big blocks for the win!).

Hangers helped to keep my cut strips organized.

No design wall? No problem! Use the space you have.

I adore scrappy quilts and this pattern is a fabulous design for pulling together as many fabrics as my heart desired.  Warm colours for the front paired with a cozy flannel backing, guarantee the year round appeal of this quilt (as our mountain night time temps are often low even in the summer months).

Running out of the solid fabric for binding provided the perfect opportunity for a touch of whimsy. Can you see it?

The binding fabric tying it all together is a Robert Kaufman Kona solid in the colour Berry. However, there's a tiny scrap of a print tucked into the binding  because I fell short (by less than two inches) to complete the perimeter in Berry and I decided I didn't want to cut a new strip.  That small peek of a print in the solid fabric binding makes for a fun detail that you won't notice, unless you're looking for it.

Machine sewing my binding had become my preferred method for finishing my quilts.  I still enjoy hand sewing the binding, but I really like the look of machine stitched and the added benefit that I can finish my quilts sooner this way. 

Here's a close-up of my machine sewn binding - showing both the front and back of the quilt. 

A big factor in the success of my machine binding, is that I use my Janome dual feed attachment with a stitch in the ditch foot, when stitching my binding down. This combination allows for me to stitch as close to the edge of the binding as I want, while keeping the seam line consistent along the edge.

Considering the flannel backing and all the seams on the quilt top, I chose to meander or stipple quilt. Free motion quilting doesn't distract from the piecework, adds beautiful texture and just happens to be something I find very relaxing to do. I think it worked beautifully on this quilt.

Coincidentally, the same winter I completed this quilt, I knitted and felted a pair of wool slippers in matching colours to my quilt.  Perhaps it's obvious by now, this colour combination is one that I adore. Although it's been three years ago since I finished them, both hand mades have been well loved and enjoyed.

Warm colours ranging from gold through maroon make this scrappy quilt very homey.