The Sweetheart Sisters

Happy Valentine's Day to everyone!  And I'm showing off my latest finishes, The Sweetheart Sisters!

If you follow my Instagram feed, you'll see one of these was quilted about 3 weeks ago with a heart panto, 

and yesterday, I got the other one finished with custom quilting, just in time for Valentine's Day.

 

These quilts all started due to a class from a fellow guild member, on using             charm packs and jelly rolls. Fortunately for me, I had an older 40 piece               charm pack laying around,

and a bunch of matching fabric that I cut into 2 1/2" strips. Who says I can't make my own jelly roll?

So off to class I went, and assembled the blocks, log cabin style.  The suggested layout for the blocks kept the longest strip always at the same spot/orientation, so that there was no worrying about matching seams.  Such a low stress quilt top!!

Being that I am always in need of baby quilts for gifts, I determined I could get two from this charm pack, with a couple squares left.  No biggie, since those were the solids--I'll use them in another project.  Hmm, where did I put those?

Anyway, this one I'm calling Big Sister because it's 4x5 blocks.

Quilting used a fleshy-pink cotton thread because that's the color that I had that matched.  I'm a big Glide fan, but the pink I had was, well, pink.  And I found an adorable heart pantograph, called Heart Fancy.

Isn't that sweet?  Here's the back for more.  BTW, the back on this one is pink, but it had hearts in it.  Hard trade off!

The other quilt is fittingly called Little Sister, as it's 4x4 blocks, with a border to help it keep up with big sister.

Not wanting to quilt the same panto, I opted for custom quilting on this one.  I had drawn a bunch of different ideas, but didn't use any of them once the quilt was on the frame.  I just went with hearts, either in the centers of the strips, or in the corners, alternating each one.  

After the first two blocks, I wasn't sure I was going to like it because it seemed repetitious, but once a row was done, it became unified.

Don't you love the hearts in the border?  So cute!

The back on this one is the fleshy-pink color, but no hearts. At least the quilting shows off nicely!

Here's a closer look.

So pull out your charm packs and jelly rolls, assemble the easy blocks, and have fun quilting!

Wishing you lots of quilty Valentine love!