Design Wall Monday

It doesn't seem like the best time to be starting new quilting projects considering all the UFOs hanging around my sewing room, but that's just what I did last week. We have two nieces and at least two friends who are all expecting babies that are due around the end of March/beginning of April. I have been invited to a baby shower and brunch in January for one of the nieces, so it's time to get going on making baby quilts.

My inspiration was a quilt I had seen on Sarah Craig's blog "Confessions of a Fabric Addict." Her starting point was a block design by Judy Martin called Star Cluster. Sarah super-sized the pattern to make a one-block quilt, and I loved the way it turned out. Here are Judy's original design and Sarah's version. If you click on the caption below either photo, you will be taken to the original source.

Star Cluster by Judy Martin

12 or 16" block

Interlocking Stars by Sarah Craig

The center of Sarah's quilt measures 64" square. She has included a great tutorial on her blog for making it (click the caption under the photo to go there.) I decided to make my baby quilt half that size. The scrappy squares for my star centers were all cut at 2.5". This part should finish at 32" square, and then I will add a border or two. I hope to finish piecing the quilt top by the end of the week. This may become my go-to baby quilt pattern for the next few quilts.

I am linking up to Design Wall Monday at Patchwork Times, Monday Making at Love Laugh Quilt, and Moving It Forward at Em's Scrapbag. Check out all of them for tons of amazing quilting inspiration!

Julie in GA