A Quilt for Lincoln

My most recent finish.  This is my second quilt for 2020 and my first baby quilt of the year.

The design was inspired in part by the recent Initial K finish posted over at Reddit.  The Initial K pattern is Vaquero.

I did my own thing with the arrows...details below.  The blocks use the technique developed by Joe Cunningham for his Rock The Block - Album Style quilt.  His lesson actually includes (3) different quilting techniques; including Rock The Block.  I've been wanting to try a full-blown Rock The Block quilt, but haven't really had the chance.  This quilt was my first opportunity to test out the technique.

I learned a few things.  One piece of advice for Rock The Block, don't use too many narrow strips.  And really don't use narrow strips that are adjacent to one another.  Another piece of advice is to plan on making many more blocks than you will need to finish the quilt.  There are many opportunities when you are trying to make a specific cut that ends up right next to a seam.  You need to have some flexibility in executing Joe's technique.

The first photo is from when I was getting the sandwich done.  I'm not really happy with how the quilting process wound up.  I learned a couple more things about that.

Click to embiggen

The second photo is the finished quilt.

Click to embiggen

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Ok...so the arrows.  From what I saw, the Initial K pattern uses blocks to create the arrows.  My intent was to be able to sew in continuous strips of the gradient material.  To do that, I had to get the pieces in the arrow strips cut just right to match.  There was a fair amount of trial and error, but this ended up working.

Step one was to fold the 2 1/2" wide gradient strip perfectly (or nearly so) in half.  Then I cut a section that is 4 3/8" from the fold.  I found that cutting that section as just slightly less than 4 3/8" worked a little better.  Hold onto the ends and leave them together.

Step two was to cut the color strips.  They were 12 1/2" long.

Step three was to cut the 30° angles at the end of the strips.  The angles were cut to the points.  Leave the gradient strip folded in half.  And make sure you get the angles in the right direction!

Step four was to sew the arrows onto the centerpieces from the gradient material.

Step five was to remove 1 7/8" from the middle portion of the remainder of the gradient strip.

You should be left with an arrow strip that is roughly the same length as an uncut gradient strip.

A modest update.  I did receive a photo of young Lincoln with his quilt.  He's a keeper.