london calling - jumping jacks quilt

It's time for the Jumping Jacks quilt! 

This is perfect for my love of all things British. Well, maybe not all things, but the pretty and tasty ones. Like Liberty of London fabric, Spode porcelain, Cath Kidston kitchenware and those yummy butter biscuits from Harrods (Have you had those biscuits? They come in butter, lemon and ginger. Seriously, have somebody bring back a tin when they visit London!) And don't even get me started on the new wave music from the 1980's or Downton Abbey.

I saw Union Jack quilts popping up all over blogland a few years ago. I loved them - all of them. But I didn't like the patterns that I bought. The most popular pattern had lots of fabric waste, and all the edges were on the bias. Another pattern was paper pieced. I find paper piecing to be too time consuming, and I hate the paper removal process - I'm one of those people who picks out the paper that surrounds each stitch with tweezers. Finally, I discovered the Jumping Jacks pattern by Fig Tree Quilts. It has almost no fabric waste and the finished block is on the straight grain. But first I needed to make a large USA red, white and blue quilt! With the recent finish of my Butterscotch Tart quilt, I felt that I could now move on to the Union Jack quilt.

My fabric is mostly assorted Tanya Whelan prints that I've been collecting. There's lots of Rosy, some Delilah and even a piece of French Hatbox. And I forgot to add the Valentine Rose fabrics into these pictures. I'm sure that they won't all end up in the finished quilt but will be inspiration throughout the project. The finished quilt contains 12 blocks and measures 71" x 84". 

The pattern is very clearly written and the blocks are easy to sew. However, the sub-units needs to be trimmed before they're sewn into the finished block. If you try this pattern, I would recommend that you read it through completely before starting. And then read it again. It's not hard, but I find that I do need to really pay attention to the direction that I'm sewing each piece. There have been a few mistakes that I'm not showing here!

There are a few of us sewing along together and posting our blocks on Instagram. You'll find them there under #jumpingjacksqal. But don't worry - I'll be showing all of my blocks right here, too!

Thanks for visiting. I'd like to let you know that I have a super-busy work week coming up. I've got lots of meetings to attend and a presentation that I need to give this week (how to increase prestige fragrance sales with movie theater and radio advertising!) This means less sewing time. I'll try to post mid-week if possible. But otherwise, I promise to be right back here with you in just one week!