This was a gift for two of my best friends who got married last summer! For their gift, I was inspired by the log cabin block, since our friends often gather at their home. I’d never done a log cabin quilt, and it’s a very traditional quilt, constructed by sewing strips of (usually) the same width to a “rotating” block.

I wanted to minimize my cutting, so I used pre-cut 2.5″ strips define my block and calculated the lengths from there. My idea was to put the strips in rainbow order and have each color “march” around the block so that, say, red would start in the first position, then for the next block, purple would be in first position and red would be in the second position. (see below) This meant I cut all of the lengths from all of the colors, with some finagling (also, see below).

Then I was able to assemble my blocks, which I did one by one because I wanted to stay super organized with the color order. They weren’t all perfect but I am super pleased with the results.

Originally I wanted to arrange the blocks in the order I made them, with red in the first position in the first block, second in the second block, but that didn’t look that good 🙂 so I mixed them up and tried to design it by keeping busy prints scattered throughout and no prints touching each other.

This was my first quilt with sashing, the borders around the blocks. Sashing can make a quilt bigger without the need for more print fabric, and gives the eye places to rest between the busy blocks. I used a nice gray for the sashing, which ended up being really nice with such vibrant, saturated colors in the blocks.

As usual, I vamped on a few motifs for the quilting – as illustrated below.

Overall, I’m really pleased with the final result and I was so happy to make a traditional quilt in a modern, bright way.

Completed June 2021.

Print: Punch Batiks by Kathy Engle for Island Batik
Binding: Wilmington Essentials – Crackle Stone by Wilmington Prints
Backing: Punch Batiks – Fern Green Apple by Kathy Engle for Island Batik