Lucky Star Quilt + Country Roads Fabrics

I've been slowly stitching away on this little project for about a month and it's been such a joy to work on.  

I have a niece expecting her first baby soon so I'll be wrapping this up with a couple of favorite story books and sending it her way.  After working on a few larger projects, it's been nice to be able to work on a smaller baby quilt for a change.  

The pattern for this quilt is called Lucky Star and it's from my book, Fresh Fat Quarter Quilts.  Lucky Star uses just 6 fat quarters and it's pretty fast to make with just four large star blocks.  

Once I got this quilt top all pieced I decided to add some big stitch quilting to it and I love the result.  I haven't done any hand quilting in years so I was a bit rusty at first but it soon became a relaxing thing for me to do in the evenings.  

For the fabrics I used a line from Poppie Cotton called Country Roads.  I was invited to make a project to help celebrate the release of this pretty line and as soon as I saw the soft pinks I knew exactly what I wanted to make.

Have you tried big stitch quilting?  I first basted my quilt and added some stitch-in-the-ditch quilting with my machine.  I didn't really want to go overboard with the hand quilting, and I also want this to stand up to being used and washed over the years.  So I think the combo of machine quilting and hand quilting will work great.  

I love how the hand stitching shows on the backing!  I'm definitely hooked on big stitch quilting now so you'll be seeing more of it around here I'm sure.  

A few things that I found helpful - if you're wanting to give it a try as well....I used Valdani thread size 8 and this Unicorn Thread Gloss made it glide so smoothly through the fabric without knotting up.  

I also love this needle minder from Flamingo Toes.  It attaches to your project with a magnet (so it doesn't make holes in your quilt) and because it's a magnet, it's a great "home base" for your needle.  If (like me) you like to sit on the sofa and stitch you definitely DON'T want to loose a needle!  

See all of Bev's needle minders here, and there are a few here at the Fat Quarter Shop as well.

Country Roads fabrics are available now - ask your local shop if they carry them or you can find them here on ETSY from S Fabrics and Designs.

You can find copies of Fresh Fat Quarter Quilts here on Amazon and autographed copies in my shop.  To read more about the book and see more of the projects, check out this post and this post.



Quilt details:
45" x 45"
Pattern: Lucky Star pattern from the book, Fresh Fat Quarter Quilts
Fabric: Country Roads by Poppie Cotton
Quilting: big stitch quilting (see above) and some straight line machine quilting