Zig Zag Nine Patch

by SueJean
(Dot Lake, Alaska, USA)

This quilt design is by Bonnie Hunter. I picked it up as a Leader's and Enders project after I finished my Postage Stamp quilt because I had so many nine patches left over.

The first problem I ran into was that the original design was made with 2" squares and all my blocks were made with 2.5" squares. Half an inch doesn't seem like that big of a deal, but when you multiply that across the size of a quilt it adds up real fast. To keep the quilt manageable, I reformulated accordingly with the overall number of blocks. The final quilt ended up a more reasonable size of 79" x 95".

The second problem was the challenge of working a quilt on the diagonal. This was my first one built that way and it required a lot of work space to do the layout. The stretchy edges scared me and I lost a lot of points, but in the end, I just didn't care. The quilt looked great to me.

The buttercream yellow material isn't plain cotton and it was a bit stretchier than the nine patch blocks. I originally planned to quilt a flower on each block but after quilting stitch in the ditch on the 9 patches, I was too scared it was going to pucker like crazy. So, instead I tied each of the yellow blocks. I like the combination of quilting and tying as it seems kind of old-fashioned in a new way to me. (A blend of old and new?)

The borders and bindings (as well as all the other fabrics) came from the thrift store and the quilt took nearly a year from start to finish with the time I had to work on it. I was nervous about the paisley but it worked out well with all the colors. I like doing the patchwork backs and this one seemed really appropriate with the 9-patches.

There are lots of fun things to "find" with all the different fabrics like an I-spy quilt. There are also lots of memories in this quilt as I can see patches from most of my previously made quilts.

The picture at the bottom is my cat inspecting her new favorite quilt. She sat next to the package the night before I took it to the post office with a disgusted look on her face. If I left it up to her, she'd keep all of them.

This quilt was given as a gift to a very dear friend. I hope she enjoys it as much as I enjoyed making it.

This article was printed from Generations-Quilt-Patterns.com

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