Finishing touches

Hello, friends! Welcome back to my quilt odyssey. We've been chugging slowly north, moving away from the hurricane zone and toward pleasant summer weather. And I've been putting together quilts for Covered in Love, using donated orphan blocks and fabric.

Today I'm sharing five quilts that all came to me as large-ish groups of blocks, making for quick assembly and easy finishes. First up is this piece with a Christmas flair. The 25 blocks in the shape of gift boxes all have holiday themes like reindeer, wreaths and ornaments. They were donated by Christine. So cute! But not quite enough for an entire quilt. 

The colors are the standard red, green and gold, with quite a bit of black mixed in. I noticed the same colors in a bag of strip blocks donated by Priscilla. I think they make a vibrant border, and the black binding helped tie it all together.

On the back, I used a big chunk of this "cheater" fabric, printed to look like antique applique blocks. It even looks like the madder reds have "bled" a bit of dye, but nope. That's printed right on the fabric. The last of Priscilla's blocks stretched the backing just enough, and this quilt was in the bag. Or the box, since that's how I ship quilts to Kat.

The next quilt was even easier to put together, since there were plenty of blocks for the entire piece. I don't even think there was one left over! I'm not sure who made these fun 16 patches, but I love the mix of bright colors against black.

And such a great variety of fabrics, too! There must be over a dozen different black background designs. It inspired me to pull out similar pieces from my stash, and use them to create the backing and binding.

They look a bit of a jumble in this view, but in person it has a kind of I-spy feeling. I hope it starts some interesting conversations and offers snuggly comfort to a family.

And moving from black to brown, this quilt came to me as a small flimsy, not just individual blocks. All I had to do was add a few borders to bring it up to size. The darker brown inner border and binding are made from donated fabric. Kat receives not only orphan blocks, but yardage, precuts and premade binding, too.

I love the mix of fabrics in this! Very rich and interesting. It looks like it might be a disappearing nine patch pattern.

For the outer border, I used this caramel map fabric that's been marinating in my stash for a while. You can see the loopy quilting that I started with. I usually quilt the borders first and then work my way to the center. That's backwards from what is often recommended, but it works for me because it keeps the edges from flapping loose and getting caught under the needle. The loopy motif gave me fits on this, so I switched to a plain old stipple once I got out of the outer border. No one will ever notice!

For the back, I pieced together some fun horses in browns, browns, and more browns. This fabric was made into curtains, probably for a child's room, and I bought it on eBay. Yards and yards for just pennies. Score!

The fourth quilt is another one made from two different sets of blocks. The central section is 12 blocks that I think are called Crown of Thorns. Set together, they make some interesting secondary patterns. Do you see 12 blocks, or 6?

Here's the 13th block on the back to help you see the underlying design. Hard to see on the front, isn't it?

And here's a closeup of some of the fun fabrics Priscilla used to make these blocks. I chose a deep red for the border to help accentuate the red HSTs.

The back is a nice panel that features wildlife scenes and picks up that same deep red from the front. I think it adds a masculine touch to the whole piece.

And finally, here is a photo from Kat's blog of an all-cream quilt made by Meg and finished by me. I couldn't take even one decent picture myself, so pop over to this post on KatAndCat quilts for a better look. I added the outer border, thin gold flange and matching binding, plus some fancy-schmancy quilting. 

Which quilt do you like best? Is it the pattern or the colors that catch your eye? Let me know in the comments!