It's finished! If you follow me on Instagram or Facebook, you've probably seen some glimpses at the Bugapalooza Picnic Blanket I have been working on. What's a picnic blanket? It's a quilt you take on picnics, or to the beach, but I know you already know that part. :)

Some folks like to use a waterproof backing, or a twill or canvas backing to make the blanket heavier. I decided to keep mine all cotton, but I choose a heavier and stiffer batting to help weigh it down a little more. Before you ask, I have no idea what kind of batting it was, it was in my studio from another project and it wasn't labeled, I just liked the weight and went with it.

Here's how I pieced the quilt top. I made this quilt half yard friendly. I used eight different half yard cuts of BugaPalooza fabric to cut the inner blocks. The inner blocks are 9" square and there are 36 of them sewn together, six rows of six.

The cream dot borders are 4.5" in width. To cut these the most efficient way I could, I cut a one yard piece of fabric in to 1/8 yards strips and then sewed two strips together. The seam of the strip lines up with the middle seam of the 36 blocks.

Then that nice big border(almost 10" wide) was added to all sides. It took me 2.5 yards of border fabric. There are four borders to one width of fabric. Two opposite sides were sewn on and trimmed and then the two remaining border pieces were sewn on. My quilt top was finished, it went together super fast.

For quilting I went with my favorite superior thread. King Tut #934 Nile Delta It's yellows and lime green. It blends nicely with all of the colors, I used it on a lot of my quilts.

I did a little meandering through the center and then did some free motion scallops to mimic the scallops on the fabric border. When it came to quilting the border, I loosely went around the flowers and insects.

Last was sewing on the binding. It's Memorial Day weekend, so I will definitely be putting this picnic blanket to use!

And if you want to make one yourself, enjoy free shipping all weekend in my web store. Enter the coupon code FREESHIP. (US orders only, expires Monday May 25th at midnight)

Here's the breakdown for cutting fabric again:
36 squares measuring 9" x 9"
4 Cream Dot Strips measuring 4.5" x 60"
4 Border pieces measuring 90" in length


Have a great day,

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