Here it is, my latest quilt, Stars in My Eyes!
The above picture is the back of the quilt because this quilt was made for Kelly Young's new book, Perfectly Pieced Quilt Backs (affiliate links), and today is the blog hop to celebrate the book's launch! Feel free to visit with the other quilters participating today, sharing their fabulous quilt backs.
Below is the front, which I've been teasing you with all the sneak peeks - this quilt is definitely a patriotic two-fer!
For my back, I channeled Kelly's improv scrap piecing technique, because of fabric limitations. Ultimately I'm thrilled I was able to pull off a coordinating back with the fabric leftovers I had and boy, was it slim pickings. But together, the front and back make a great combo!
So, a bit of history on this quilt. The front, specifically the blue scrap blocks, were created in January for RSC2023. I wanted to use up my blue scraps to make enough blocks for a complete quilt. But then the realization hit me that an all-blue quilt was just, well, boring. That's when the idea came to give the quilt a patriotic theme, as anything red, white, and blue is a favorite! It was also a great way to use up bits and pieces of end-of-bolt Fireworks kit fabric.
As for the quilt's name, Stars in My Eyes, that was inspired by the striped pinwheels, as those could really make your eyes spin and possibly see stars!
Since this quilt (and post) is more about the back, there were several quilt back patterns from Kelly's Perfectly Pieced Quilt Backs book that I considered for this quilt, such as this one for it's simplicity.
Or this one, as it's design would coordinate well with the front,
or this one, which would use up more of the blue scraps.Tough to choose, right?
Unfortunately, with my fabric constraints, none of those backs would work. So, I chose to design with what I had.
Here's a picture of my evolving back, all based around the four not-the-same-size light blue star yardage pieces. Those pieces, along with the large pinwheel are laying on the finished top, exposing the space I need to fill in.
Ultimately, I decided to build around all for sides of the pinwheel for a more symmetrical look, using narrow blue starred yardage, then adding more blue scrap pieced blocks,
and finally a border using the light blue star print.Though this is not one of Kelly's designs, I'm pretty happy with how well it turned out, getting it to coordinate with the front plus using up leftovers and scraps.
Enough about my quilt - let's talk more about Kelly's new book! Of course I only showed three back patterns that I considered - there are seriously a ton of choices! Perfectly Pieced Quilt Backs contains 30 different quilt backs, split between those that use scraps and leftovers, and those using stash and yardage. Plus, each pattern is given in three different sizes, which is always a win-win! Here's an example of a Twin XL and a Queen.And there's more! As an extra special bonus, Perfectly Pieced Quilt Backs offers 18 FREE lap size downloadable bonus patterns for the quilt 'fronts' featured in the book. All total, that makes 48 quilt patterns -WOW! Here's a sample of two.
Kelly, as always, makes her scrap quilting theory and patterns easy to follow, even including quilt finishing instructions. Definitely a complete quilting book!
Speaking of finishing, Stars in My Eyes includes quilting the pantograph Fireworks, using a light blue thread so as not to detract from the pinwheel blocks, yet showing up nicely on the dark blue blocks.
Overall, I think I nailed it! And with Fourth of July coming up, it's ready for display. Excited that it joins Patriotic Wave, Four Star Salute, Fireworks, and Liberty, plus several more - I do love red, white, and blue!
If you want to up your quilt backing game, I highly recommend Perfectly Pieced Quilt Backs. You can find it through your favorite online booksellers, or for a signed copy, hop over to Kelly's Etsy shop.
Happy Quilting everyone!
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My Favorite Patterns
