Makin' Honey from Bees 'n Blooms

KT Winner

Congrats to Carol Feye, you're the winner of a Bees 'n Blooms booklet. Please email your mailing address to Jamie at lynne@ktquilts.com. She'll send it out as soon as they're done in late Feb/early March. I'd love to see a picture of your hanging ornaments! Sounds very cool.

Vintage Hexs Made Easy

My love affair with quilts began many years ago when I slept under my Gramma's quilts. She only made three, as was the custom (and her Mother's requirement) for her hope chest. Her real love was rug hooking. I was lucky enough to receive one of the quilts she made as a young woman when I married. I loved that quilt - a double wedding ring with cheddar yellow background and scrappy 30's prints. We used it on our bed, washed it and loved it practically to death over the years. I took my first quilting class to reproduce the vintage quilts I was drawn to, but couldn't afford to purchase as a new wife/mom/student. My mission was to make new quilts that looked and felt like Gramma's. I was fortunate to take quilting classes from a shop owner that collected vintage quilts and totally got it. The traditional patterns and earthy fabrics she chose recreated the look I adored. Over the years, I've adapted and simplified those traditional blocks with my Layered Patchwork technique so I can make more vintage inspired quilts for everyone in my family. One of the latest challenges was this elongated hexagon quilt that I found at an antique show a couple years ago. It's been hanging in my studio ever since, whispering to me that there has to be a way....

After many unsuccessful attempts, the light bulb finally went on and I saw this design in it's simplest form - rectangles and triangles. The revelation was this isn't made as a single block, but in parts laid out in horizontal rows. By layering/topstitching triangles over the corners of large rectangles for one row and sewing matching skinny rectangles together in the alternating row, it creates the elongated hex I was craving. No inset seams and no raveling since the triangles are cut with the bias edge exposed. Hallelujah!

 The finished quilt made with a Layer CakeTM is modeled below by my grandaughter, Aleece. I'm totally in love with BOTH of them!

The mini version featuring a charm pack...

The pattern is called Makin' Honey because that's what bees do in their honeycomb. Both of these sizes plus a runner are included in the Bees 'n Blooms booklet (retail $15.95, available March 2016). My next project is to cut pieces from over 400 different KT fabrics to have a true charm hex quilt.

To receive a Bees 'n Blooms scrap bundle, comment here. Would you like to try this layered patchwork technique?