Life's Little Junkets: Big Christmas Finish

I haven't posted since July as I've been working on three quilts for Christmas presents. One was a surprise for my cousin and her husband. Usually when working on the kids' quilts, I'd be sending her fabric selection and progress shots. This time I had to work extra-hard to not slip and say anything.

The pattern is Hip 2 Be Square. I saw it in my LQS a couple of years ago and bought it, vowing I would make it some time. What I didn't realize at the time was this was written for a full-size quilt and had no other size options. I needed to MacGyver this pattern into a queen. I consulted the helpful ladies at Gina's Bernina on how I might be able to accomplish this. We decided on expanding the number of fabrics utilized instead of just increasing the amount of fabric for the original number of prints on the pattern.

The feature fabric is a Robert Kaufman Totally Tropical sea turtle print I found online. My cousin loves sea turtles and we got to see them during a trip to Mexico in 2013.

I used excel to draw out columns & rows to make it the desired size. The original size is outlined in bold. I also color-coded the five blocks and did a dry run at their order.

In laying out the 12 1/2-inch squares, I realized some of them were wonky. Off so much in some places that I wouldn't have 1/4" or close to that for a seam allowance.

It took some time and there wasn't much help on the internet, so I'm talking about this in the hopes it may help someone else in a similar situation. I did multiple searches and finally found someone who admitted she trimmed down squares to make it work. The easiest way I could think to accomplish this was to go to a glass shop and get a 12-inch square piece of plexiglass. I drew diagonal lines and horizontal and vertical mid-point lines so I could center the various styles of squares. It worked!

First I went with seven columns and eight rows of the trimmed squares. I placed it on my guest bed to see how it looked. I wasn't quite happy with the drop on the sides, as I remembered she had a taller mattress. I stewed on that for a couple of weeks while working on another project, and ultimately added an eighth column before piecing the back and taking it to the long arm quilter. There was a 4 1/2-inch border of smaller squares, but I opted not to add them.

I think it turned out well, considering it was my first queen and the wonky block problem. It was the only non-rainy day before Christmas and it was very cold, so these pics were taken very quickly.

Here's a closer look at the different blocks and fabrics:

Debbie at Smoky Mountain Quilts performed magic with her long arm and also did the binding. I believe the pattern is called Calm Water or it's something close to it. Debbie used a variegated blue-green thread that worked very well on the quilt.