I know this post is a little late, but the holidays went so fast this year that I think I may have blinked, thus missing the whole experience. We had family come to town right before thanksgiving, and then we were able to have more family come to town for Christmas, which hardly ever happens.
There’s really lots of things that have delayed this quilt post. I can’t blame it all on visitors. I actually started this quilt a couple of years ago. I was trying to clean out old scraps and I came across a bag of Christmas pieces. Some had come from my moms stash during her clean out, and some were in mine.
I was going to get rid of them, they were even in the sale pile. But one of the fabrics looked familiar. I pulled out Christmas tree pictures and realized they were the scraps from our tree skirt, which was made by my grandmother many, many years ago!
Well, now I couldn’t get rid of the scraps. I pulled them out and thought about what I could do with them. It occurred to me that my fave block pattern, Granny’s Square, would be a perfect tribute to my grandmother.
Instead of 2 ½ inch squares, I went with 2 inch squares so I could get more out of the fabric and therefore have more variety in the overall pattern. I picked a simple kona snow white for the background and started sewing things together.
I didn’t have quite enough, but I wanted to use every scrap so I made a couple of the blocks slightly differently. My intent was to use the outcasts to make a table runner but I needed a couple more blocks to finish my top, so in they go!
To make the top a little bigger, I added another scrap of red that I had, which is such a nice and simple border. I set the blocks on point for dimension, but also to make the overall quilt size a little bigger. I was trying to think of what size works best for us.
Because this was a scrappy quilt, I didn’t really have a backing in mind. I had checked my favorite shops for possible sales with no luck. Then I went to our LQS and struck gold with this beautiful fabric of Christmas colors and Christmas trees, and deer; it was perfect! And even better, it was on clearance! Yay!
I used a basic meander for the quilting, and picked out a green binding that pulled from the green on the back. It worked out perfectly. So many different fabrics I thought I didn’t want that played a huge role in making this finish happen.
I am so glad I was finally able to get this one done. It’s a great addition to our holiday décor, and it reminds me of my grandma every time I see it.
