Flower Boxes Tutorial

I’m trying to clean out my fabric stash, and had this pretty flower fabric to use. I wanted to do something with larger pieces so the blooms wouldn’t be cut too small. I settled on a faux log cabin block. Instead of sewing strips around all 4 sides of a center square, I am sewing strips onto just two sides. I’m not used to naming quilts, other than by the name of the recipient, but I think this quilt is called Flower Boxes.
In order to get the largest possible cut, I ended up with 5 inch squares. That’s a weird size to start with, but I wanted to use as much of the flower fabric as I could. Even so, I have plenty of left over fabric. Some of the binding, maybe? Or back into the stash for another day?

Log cabins are awesome. You can make your quilt bigger or smaller than mine by making your starting square bigger or smaller, by using thicker or thinner strips, or by using more or less strips. If freewheeling isn’t your style, don’t worry, I’ve got exact cutting measurements for you. I cut my strips 2 inches wide, which will leave the finished pieces 1½ inches wide. Any bigger seemed too big, any smaller seemed too small.

I pulled fabrics from my stash (maybe cleaning out my stash should have been one of my 2018 goals…) in the color palette of the flowers, and creams/off whites to match the background.
I made half of my blocks with colored fabric, and half with neutrals.

Materials:
For each block you will need:
• (1) 5 inch square
• (1) 2 inch by 5 inch
• (2) 2 inch by 6 ½ inch
• (2) 2 inch by 8 inch
• (2) 2 inch by 9 ½ inch
• (1) 2 inch by 11 inch
Keep in mind, changing the size of your starting square or width of strips will change the length of the strips as well.
Place a 2” by 5” piece of colored fabric on top of the 5 inch square, right sides together. If your fabric is directional like mine, place this first piece on the right side of the print. Stitch with a ¼ inch seam. Press towards the colored fabric.

You are now working with a piece that is 5 by 6 ½. Turn this piece so the colored strip is above the flowered print and the stem side of the fabric is pointing to the right. Place a 2 by 6 ½ piece of fabric, right sides together, on top of the 5 by 6 ½ piece of fabric, on the stem sides of the fabric. Sew with a ¼ inch seam and iron towards the colored strip.

For your next seam, your 6 ½ inch square will be on the top, and your 2 inch by 6 ½ inch strip will be on the bottom. Continue to use a ¼ inch seam and to press towards the most recently added fabric.

Now add a 2 inch by 8 inch strip, again with the colored fabric on the bottom. Turning from top to bottom after every few seams keeps the whole thing with straight edges. Always adding your new colored strip to the top of what you’ve already done will eventually lead to your square becoming slightly rounded.

Switch back to colored fabric on top, add a 2 inch by 8 inch strip

and then a 2 inch by 9 ½ inch strip.

The last two colored strips (2 inch by 9½ inch and 2 inch by 11 inch) will be sewn to the bottom.

Voila! An 11 inch block!

I recommend chain piecing, one after another, stopping to iron after all strips of a given size have been added, rather than making each block one at a time.
I was pretty sure I wanted the neutral fabric blocks to be the reverse of the colored fabric blocks, but I didn’t have a clear enough picture in my mind to be confident that using the left and top sides of the flower block would create the overall quilt pattern I was looking for.
So, because I am such a professional, I laid it all out on the floor.

This made me see that, yes, switching to the left and top sides of the flower fabric would create exactly what I wanted it to.
For the neutral blocks, follow the same method as the colored blocks, with two notable differences.
1. Sew your first piece on to the left side of the print, and the second to the flower bloom side (By “bloom side” I mean the top, as opposed to the stem side bottom), these blocks will be opposites of the colored blocks.
2. Start with the flower square on top and the 2 inch by 5 inch strip on the bottom. Continue to do two on bottom and then two on top while adding neutral strips.

All 20 blocks laid out on the floor.

My quilt will finish at 42 ½ inches by 51 inches. I will use a scrappy binding, do you think the creams or the colors will look better?
Now that I have it all laid out, I see how better measuring could have made all of the flower blocks line up, corner to corner. If the total width of the strips had been equal to the size of the original flower block, all those corners would line up so nicely along the diagonal. I think I might make this pattern again, with different fabrics, and refigure the size of the squares and rectangles, just to achieve that effect!