I had seen this top in various versions made up on line. I wasn’t really interested in making it, but after working on some intense piecing of quilts, I came across some fabric that told me it would be interested in making into this design.

LOL

Let me get back to this fabric. I had pulled this fabric out of my bookshelf multiple times because I liked it. Then I saw that it actually wasn’t nearly as much yardage as I had thought - as it was already partially large cut pieces of scrubs. But I still liked it. Each time I wanted to use it, I had pulled it as a potential backing. That wasn’t going to work for that. However, I still liked it every time I saw it. I wanted to use it and then I wouldn’t see what I thought was a large bundle and keep pulling it.

I first saw this design in one of the Lori holt books I have - well, maybe not the first time I saw it. I think I had seen someone on a group somewhere share something like it- and I found it interesting.

Then, when I got my Farm Girl Vintage 2 book, Lori had a whole section on these Gingham quilts. I actually thought they were humorous - I mean, seriously, why make a gingham quilt when you can just use the fabric?

However, I had seen some cute ones that a long armer was sharing and I was in my fabric room and decided that I kept pulling out this green fabric thinking I thought it would be nice to finally use it. Well, OK, I didn’t think these quilts were cute like Millie’s Dresses or some of the house quilts I’ve made, but you know what I mean - an interesting idea.

I found this other lighter print fabric - “it” was actually 4 king size pillowcases made out of 100% cotton. It’s super nice fabric. I hope it will quilt well. I then chose a white on white print as my light.

I chose the large lap size out of the book to make. Why? Well, with these Lori Holt quilts, I don’t think I’ll use these on my bed, and I’m much more likely to use them as gifts to family and friends. A lap size might be very handy for that, especially if they really like green/purple. I can think of at least three people who like these colors in my family. :)

Lori designed all the sizes in the book - from small doll size to a large queen simply by increasing the size of the blocks. All are the same number of actual blocks.

The smallest ones are using 1.5” squares and the largest, 10.5”. I decided to make the large lap and that one called for 7.5” squares. I needed 49 of the mediums, 30 of the darks and 20 of the white.

I started putting it together and almost got the whole top together in about an hour once it was cut. I did not strip piece it as I found it plenty fast to just piece the rows, press them and then put it together. I was stopped by finding a couple of problems with my whites (I found 2 pieces with holes in them!) and I ended up needing to cut a couple more squares.

Since my dining room table was all cleaned up because of company, I had to wait.

Anyway, once I got back to it, it went together quickly. The fabrics in this one are NOT Lori Holt, but the pattern is directly from her book—as much as this pattern needs a pattern - I did look at the diagram in the book. I was wondering how mine would turn out because all of her samples in the book use small prints and my darker print is actually a beautiful print with some interesting designs in it but in one way would I call that print “small”.

So, this one is officially the Farm Girl Gingham Quilt top found in the Farm Girl Vintage 2 by Lori Holt. But honestly, if this is the only one you want to do, there are several tutorials on You Tube that will show you what to do. Just type in gingham quilt.

This is supposed to be a modern quilt. I kind of smile at that idea. But people can call anything they want modern or vintage or retro, or whatever. It is whatever you want it to be, right?

When it comes to quilts, that’s my take anyway. It’s hard for me to think that anything with the name gingham in it is considered modern.

Actually I had enough of the lighter green fabric left that I cut the leftover pillowcase (I started with four) into 4.5” squares and cut more of that butterfly print into 4.5” squares and cut some other white into the same and hope to make up a smaller block quilt quilt - may end up being a bigger quilt, however. We’ll see. I have the pieces cut up but don’t have it sewn together as I got sidetracked on a different project.

I’ll sew it together when I’m feeling the need for a reasonably quick finish though with a lot more pieces, it won’t be as fast as this one as I think I have over 100 of the medium greens cut out (instead of 49 which this one uses).

I did press my seams all to one side on this one - and not open as Lori almost always recommends. Pressing to the side made it very fast. Pressing open is harder to do and takes a lot more time and harder to match the corners when sewing the rows together. I may spend some more time pressing - from the top this time. I have a nicer iron actually on the main floor of my house and may do it before quilting. I do tend to find that after quilting and washing, most of the pressing issues are long gone to to the crinkling of the fabric/batting in the wash.

Thanks so much for coming along with me on this journey.

This will make yet another top out of my Lori Holt books. Here they are: