That 70s Quilt: Wonky 9-Patch

The idea to make 9-patches for That 70s Quilt has been with me almost from the beginning. Making them wonky, however, is a bit more recent.

I knew I didn’t want to make a sampler quilt; I simply wanted a way to show off the designs from Alexander Henry’s In the Kitchen line while also making something representative of the late sixties and seventies. The basic 9-patch showed up on television (Brady Bunch, Hollywood squares) and art (Andy Warhol’s Marilyn Monroe) from that era, so I figured it would be a good fit. It wasn’t until I saw a design by Glenn Dragone from yarn+needle (www.glenndragone.com) that he did for the Moda Bake Shop called Square Dance (http://www.modabakeshop.com/2011/12/square-dance-quilt.html) that I knew my 9-patches would have to be wonky.

First off, I’d have to make sure that my chosen Alexander Henry fabrics would work well together, especially with the Heidi Grace print I found at Joann’s and a fat quarter stripe I got at Hancock’s. So after laying them onto my cutting table, I decided the color scheme would work. I was a little iffy on the blue paisley and larger floral since they aren’t from that line, but they help add a little more blue into the quilt from the Spotted Owl prints.

Next it was time to actually start cutting the wonky 9-patches from the solids. After choosing two of the 10-inch squares I’d cut the night before, I carefully placed them together and using my long ruler and a rotary cutter, began making my cuts.

Once the cuts were done, I carefully switched out every other square for the one beneath it to create them.

After matching the edges, I strip pieced where I could, pressing my seams open as I went to reduce bulk, and within no time I had a finished block.

The best part is that for every cut I made it did double duty. Tonight after work I might just try my hand at cutting four at a time!