It’s ironic that most quilters are artists who love color, texture and fabric, and fear numbers. Yet, patchwork quilting requires the use of numbers almost as much as those other elements. Patchwork quilts are made of squares, or blocks, repeated and multiplied by rows and columns. So quilters must use math to be successful. I am definitely a member of the “can’t handle math” sisterhood. Instead of fearing numbers let’s learn to appreciate quilting math with in this Sunday Quilt Inspiration that is all about numbers. Want a little more inspiration? Visit last weeks’ SQI here.
4 Starting easy: four patch
9 A plus quilt made from nine patch blocks.
20 A log cabin block with five strings per side, requiring 20 strings per block. They come together surprisingly fast and can have any number of strings.
5 Rail fence blocks made with five rails, but you can have as many as you want, just keep the blocks are square. Great way to use 2½ inch strips. Sew, cut, arrange, done!
9 Soft Irish Chain quilt, made with nine patches paired with white squares to form the chains. I love the beautiful quilting. Here’s the math: five pairs per row times eleven rows = 55 pairs for a total of 110 blocks. I can almost guarantee that I’d math something wrong.
16 This one looks difficult, but it’s really not. The 16 square blocks are made from four patches that are arranged with opposing dark and light squares. The light squares always touch to form an inner square. Then the big blocks are alternated with medium contrast single blocks. Easy, but dramatic.
8 A pretty pinwheel takes only eight pieces: four half-square triangles arranged to form the pinwheels. Gotta love that quilting!
1 Last one: a whole cloth quilt that takes only one huge piece of fabric and some talented quilting. How cool it would be to have the ability to have this level of quilting?
Aren’t you just a little more appreciative of numbers? Visit my Pinterest “Heart, quilts” board for more inspiration from about 13,200 pins! Now that’s a number! If you’d like to join the fun and pin to this board, just say the word, and I’ll gladly add you to the pinners’ list. Thanks for stopping by!
