A Year of Red and White Quilt Challenge

I was so excited at the beginning of the year when Sew Cal Gal introduced a year long challenge. I loved that there were several phases involved in the challenge including a phase focusing on designers! My only problem was the challenge was red and white. I think every quilter has one color that she (or he) absolutely hates. For me that color is red. I think a lot of it goes back to the fact that I have a lot of pink tones in my skin that are exaggerated when I wear red. I've avoided all shades of red clothing for so long that when I started quilting I naturally avoided red fabric. 

For some strange reason I haven't been able to forget about this challenge. One of the prizes of the Design It! Challenge is the opportunity to work with Island Batik to make your quilt and possibly even have Island Batik offer the winning design as a free pattern on their website. When I saw all of the great red fabrics that Island Batik offers I knew I had to design a quilt for this challenge. I love the drunkard's path block and it works perfectly for red and white quilts. After a lot of playing I came up with this design which uses 7" blocks and finishes at 104"x104".

Fabric Requirements: 

6 1/4 yards white fabric

6 3/4 yards red fabric

I know that a bed sized drunkard's path quilt isn't going to appeal to everyone. I was lucky to attend a great workshop that took the fear out of the drunkard's path block, but for lots of people curved seams are scary. I set to work designing a quilt with inspiration from my first quilt that a quilter of any skill level could make without fear. I settled on this variation. This quilt uses 5" blocks and finishes 60"x60".

Fabric Requirements:

2 yards white fabric

1 1/4 yards bright red

1 1/4 yards dark red

Be sure to go check out the other designs at Sew Cal Gal!