Quilt Finish: A Little Something Spooky

October 2021 was my Quilt n' Sisters retreat. This year we went to Lancaster County, PA.  Whenever we get together, we do a fun swap. The swap gifts have been getting bigger and bigger - at least one person always brings a quilt to gift. Over the years, I've been lucky enough to receive 2 quilts in our swaps. This year I decided that I would make a quilt for the event.

Given the time of year, I quickly settled on the idea of making a Halloween witch-hat quilt.  Two years ago, Polkadot Chair released her Halloween Haberdashery quilt and I decided to make an improv version of that. In my version,  I wanted hats with bigger brims, and more variety in their placement within the block and in their shape. Above is where I started...but things evolved a little bit in the layout process.

The construction of these blocks was very similar to my little improv tents quilt: triangles on a big background. These hats would just have a hat band and brim instead of a tent door.  I planned to use one fat quarter per block for background.  Around this time, I decided that I really was going to like the quilt and wanted one for myself...so I decided to make two: one to swap and one to keep for myself. 

I made a few blocks to test my construction method, and then pinned combinations of backing + hat + band fabrics to my design wall to make sure that I liked my combos.

As more and more blocks began to accumulate on my design wall, I decided to go with a staggered layout.

I backed the quilt with minky and had it quilted with a spiky design. For binding, I went with a black and white print from Carolyn Friedlander.

This quilt finishes at 60" x 72". The blocks were trimmed to 12.5" square (unfinished) - 28 blocks per quilt. I had a lot of fun using bolder than normal low-volume prints for backing, along with seasonal prints that I've been collecting.

The house next door to our retreat Air BNB was a funeral home and was prefect for lots of Fall quilt photos.  Love the little owl serving as gate-keeper too!  For lots more retreat pictures, check out Quilt n' Sisters on Instagram.