Milk Money Quilt Block Tutorial

The project I'm sharing with you today is the most fun I've had in ages. I could not stop making these cute little blocks. If you like fussy cutting, you're in for a treat today.

Do you remember bringing a quarter to the cafeteria every day to buy your pint of milk at lunchtime? I do. This quilt block brings together my love of retro packaging, fussy cutting, and downright nostalgia. It's also a great way to use up tiny scraps of special prints that I keep stashed in a drawer because I just can't bear to throw away even the littlest bits. 

I had so much fun working thematically on each block, picking a main color and theme for each pint of milk or fruit juice. I joined my six blocks together with pale pink sashing and strawberry squares, adding a thin border of red and white polka-dot print to give the illusion of piping around the edge. 

The backing is a pink retro floral dot. The finished cover is a little smaller than the 12 x 16" form that I was just barely able to cram inside, but it gives me a beautiful overstuffed pillow for my breakfast nook. I'm absolutely crazy about it, and I wanted to share the pattern with you so that you can make something fun for yourself. These little blocks would be adorable on a lunch bag, water bottle carrier, table runner, coaster, or even a baby quilt. Here's the tutorial!

Milk Money Quilt Block
Finished Block Size: 3.5 x 3.75”

Materials

From white solid cut:

• (2) 1 x 1” squares (A)

• (1) 1 x 1.5” rectangle (B)

• (2) 1 x 3.25” strips (C)

• (2) 4 x 1” strips (D)

From navy hexagon print cut:

• (2) 1 x 1” squares (E)

From navy stripe print cut:

• (1) 2 x 1” strip (F)

From navy gingham print cut:

• (1) 2.5 x 1” rectangle (G)

From floral print cut:

• (1) 1.5 x 2.25” rectangle (H)

From feature print cut:

• (1) 2 x 2.25” rectangle (I)

Instructions

1. Sew the right edge of the H piece to the left edge of the I piece. Sew an A square to the right short edge of the F strip.

2. Using the photo above as a guide (different colors because this was taken after I finished the navy block -- sorry!), position an E square on the lower edge of the B rectangle with right sides together (RST). Place the other E square on the left end of the G rectangle RST and the other A square on the right end of the G rectangle, also RST. Follow the drawn lines on the squares in the photo above to see which direction to sew in order to create half square triangle edges on the rectangles. After sewing the diagonal lines, measure 1/4" from the stitched line and trim off the rest, pressing the seam open.

When you're finished, the pieces should look like the photo above.

3. Sew the lower edge of the A/F strip to the upper edge of the E/G/A strip.

4. Sew the right edge of the E/B strip to the left edge of the piece you made in step 3. Then sew the lower

edge of that combined piece to the upper edge of the H/I piece.

5. Sew a C strip to the right and left edges of the block.

6. Sew a D strip to the upper and lower edges of the block.

And that's it! If you make one of these and share it on social media, please tag

it #milkmoneyquiltblock and tag me @fabricmutt. I would love to see your work.

Have fun!

Darling Gift Bag: Birthday Edition

I restarted my Instagram page this week after a pause of about three years, and it's been a whole lot of fun. Chatting with old friends and seeing all the gorgeous projects on there has been amazing. I'm trying to find a way back into my happy sewing time again this summer, but carefully...lest I fall back down the rabbit hole of obsession. It's a fine line to walk, so I'm constantly checking myself. I really miss sewing with friends, but I want to do things right this time around -- or at least better. One day at a time, as they say...

I've been wanting to try resewing a few of my patterns and tutorials, starting with the most recent: the Darling Gift Bag tutorial.

I put together a fabric audition based on the colors of a birthday candle print from Buttercream by Emily Taylor for Cloud 9 Fabrics, which is the sweetest little retro collection. I've always been partial to a color scheme of white, red, blue, and pink, and these colors look so sweet paired with a polka-dot cream linen from my stash. 

The patchwork squares finish at 1". I love them so much.

A tiny picnic gingham from Buttercream makes cute handles, and I used the candles print for the lining. 

Normally the tutorial calls for an elastic and button closure on top, but I really loved the way the bag looked before sewing the button on -- sort of like a mini grocery tote bag -- so I just snipped off the elastic I had sewn on earlier and left it as is. I'll probably end up gifting this to someone, but for now, I'm just so happy looking at it on the table beside me while I plan my next sewing project.

Way Forward

My Greek Cross quilt is finished at last, beautifully quilted by my sweet friend Jennifer of Farm Fresh Stitches, washed and dried to crinkly perfection, and now lovingly draped across the arm of the overstuffed chair in my bedroom. A quilt used to take me about a month to sew from start to finish. This time it took a year and a half from piecing the first block to putting the last stitch in the binding, but considering everything else that happened in that span of time, this feels like a special victory.

This quilt was for me and my husband, so I used a lot of vintage style prints for the centers since we both love that look. Each block felt like its own little work of art. I've really come to believe that if you love every block by itself, you'll love them all together as a group, especially if it's a large group. Sometimes quantity really does seem to enhance the quality.

I've been doing a lot of cleaning and purging over the last few months, trying to let go of things I don't need and share them with others who might be able to use them. As I was going through my storage room, I came across several large containers of sewing samples made over a few years. It was a little sobering to look at all those projects, sewn up quickly and compulsively so that I would have a large enough supply of bright, shiny photos to put in my Instagram feed. I think I would rather stop sewing altogether than get back on that hamster wheel. Meaningful, enjoyable projects -- no matter how long or short a time they take to complete -- seem like the sane and happy way forward.

Life As I Know It

Now that we're a few days into the new year, I feel like I can finally sit down and write about the old one. 2023 was rough for our family, and while I'm thankful for the good things, I'm not terribly sorry to see it go. My father had three surgeries on his heart over several months, one being particularly delicate and serious. And then three weeks after his last surgery, I had a hysterectomy in an attempt to heal the anemia that I've been dealing with for years, the original health problem that forced me to take a break from professional sewing work back in 2020. It was, to say the least, a lot to deal with all at once. We spent months in recovery with some very difficult days, but the Lord brought us through it. Both Dad and I are doing very well at this point, in so much better shape than I would have expected, and we couldn't be more grateful for the dear friends from our church family who carried us through that time with prayer, encouragement, and lots of home cooked meals. 

In light of all that, there wasn't quite as much sewing as I'd hoped there would be in the second half of the year, but I did manage to fit in a few projects during the last few months.

A zipper pouch for a dear friend of mine...

A little quilt for a sweet mama who just had her second baby girl...

And the beginnings of a clamshell project using paper templates from the Etsy shop of one of my longest and dearest quilting friends, Erin of Why Not Sew. I have yet to sew these together, but they've been waiting for me on a wooden tray in my sewing room. I went with a breakfast theme in my fabric choices, an ode to my youngest daughter who loves the first meal of the day, and my plan is to eventually turn these into a pillow for our breakfast nook.

I have fabric for two more quilts on my sewing table right now. One will be a baby quilt for another friend who's due in early summer, and the other will be a graduation quilt for my eldest daughter who finishes high school in late May. It's such an interesting pairing, those two quilts-to-be -- the beginning and end of childhood in two stacks of fabric. I was sorting out the prints for my daughter's quilt the other day and was reminded again that life as I know it will be changing forever at the end of spring. This is the way it is, I tell myself. Every mother comes to this moment. It's good and right that our children grow up and become the independent adults we wanted them to be, and I wouldn't have it any other way, really. But there are moments when my heart cries...just a little.

Giddy

My girls came home on Saturday, giddy and exhausted after almost a week of having all kinds of fun at church camp. It was the first time all three of them had been away from me at once, and I honestly wasn't sure how I was going to deal with it. After more than sixteen years of motherhood, I'm a little out of practice at living life without kids around. But having enjoyed a quiet week of dinner dates, shopping trips, swimming, sewing, and long conversations with James and my parents, I feel like I've been given such a gift. I can appreciate all the joys of motherhood right now, enjoy watching my girls grow in confidence and independence, and know that there will still be a wonderful life waiting for me when they leave the nest someday. It's like getting a small glimpse of the future while still being so thankful for today. 

But truly, the sewing was fantastic this week -- hours all by myself in the loft finishing my Greek Cross quilt top while simultaneously starting another quilt that I designed years ago for my unrealized Carnival of Patchwork book. I sewed more in the last six days than I have in the last six months. Small projects have always been my specialty because that's usually all I have time for, and to some extent, I didn't have the patience or attention span for large quilts. But now I can really see the pleasure of working on extended projects. 

I'd like to think it's because I'm growing up a little bit in my forties, or maybe I'm just finally settling down. Either way, this seems like a good development, and I'm feeling rather giddy about it myself.

Summer Days

My husband remarked just the other day that our summer is already a third over which seems incredible to me. Didn't we just start this vacation train? Granted, the last month has been packed with events of all kinds, but more on that in a minute. First...pillows!

When I have the chance, I try to sew a pillow or two for the local pregnancy care center. They put together the most beautiful supply baskets for new moms, and they like to have something handmade on top. Since I'm currently pathetically slow when it comes to churning out even a baby quilt, I've taken to sewing up pillows instead, and so far it's working out quite nicely. Both of these are actually from a few months ago, so I'm a little late in sharing them. But I'm hoping to have more finished by the end of vacation.

I love having the chance to use up some of the children's fabric leftover from sewing samples for Riley Blake several years back. Jill Howarth is still one of my favorite designers, and even though my daughters have outgrown these sorts of prints, I still like to keep this type of fabric around for baby gifts and that sort of thing. Making these pillows is also a fun way to play with different blocks, which keeps it interesting for me as I sew.

I pulled out a stack of quilt blocks last night that I started working on over a year ago. It was so great to see them with fresh eyes and remember how much I loved putting these fabric combinations together over time. I'm hoping to finally sew them into a quilt top this week if all goes as I plan.

The hardest thing this summer has been that my dad's heart started to fail 4 weeks ago, and he wound up in the hospital getting a pacemaker put in, which is thankfully working so far. Unfortunately, it looks like he'll be going back in for open heart surgery soon to fix a few other serious issues that need attention. There have been lots of tests and appointments this month, but we're glad he's getting the help he needs and praying that all goes well. 

Last weekend my parents' celebrated 47 years of marriage, and I threw them a small dinner party themed around their honeymoon which was spent on a road trip up through California and then back down the Pacific Coast. 

They drove to Yosemite and Lake Tahoe, and even got to see the Righteous Brothers and the Carpenters in concert during their trip. I've heard many times how beautiful it was and how much they loved it. 

I used some leftover wool felt to sew up bunting to hang overhead and little camp flags for each place setting. Bunny brought down her record player and vintage vinyl to listen to (she was extremely proud that she scored an inexpensive Righteous Brothers record at the local antiques mall just a few days before the party) while we enjoyed our picnic lunches and cake.

It was such a sweet time. 

My husband's best friend came out from Southern California to stay with us during the week of their anniversary, and it was such a joy to have him here. He got to see the Texas Hill Country at its absolute best, with blue skies full of puffy clouds, wildflowers blooming everywhere, and lazy evenings on the back patio watching the fireflies play. 

My own flower garden was all decked out in vibrant colors, and I was so thankful to get one last beautiful week of spring before the switch flipped to summer and the whole outdoors morphed overnight into a giant sauna. But that just gives me a good excuse to stay inside and sew, which I'm trying to do for at least fifteen minutes every day this summer. It's been doing me a world of good to get daily creative time, and I'm absolutely loving it.

Drum Stick Bag

There have been so many signs this year that my daughters aren't little girls anymore, and one of the biggest is our loft. The toys that cluttered the floor in that room for years are gone, packed away over the summer except for a few small bins of toddler playthings that my girls use when they're babysitting. Except for the occasional Lego project or jigsaw puzzle on the breakfast nook table, that part of our life seems to be over. My feelings on the subject are decidedly mixed. Nostalgia gets the better of me now and then, but honestly, it's wonderful to see the girls growing up. There's so much to love about this new chapter in our lives, and the loft has become part of that story. What used to be the play area has now become the music studio, and it's definitely one of the most popular hangouts in our house.

We've always been a musical family. James and I both spent time learning music when we were growing up, and I've been singing for school, church, and other events since I was a child. Any number of instruments have found a place in our home over the years and each of us can play at least a little bit on one or more of them: piano, guitar (acoustic and electric), ukulele, banjo, and mandolin. We took things to a whole new level this year when my youngest daughter was given an electric drum set by a family friend who was heading off to college and didn't need it anymore. Mouse had already started taking drum lessons from one of the drummers at our church, and this allowed her skills to really take off. Bunny and Bear have both been singing on youth worship teams at church and putting in more time on piano and guitar this year, so it just seemed natural for the three of them to form their own band. While I'm always here to advise them when they need help, it's been fantastic to watch them work together to choose music, practice for hours on end, and then perform for the family every few months on special holidays. Right now they're working on a Valentine's Day program, and it already sounds pretty great. 

Anyway, Mouse has been asking me to sew a special bag for carrying her drum sticks to her weekly lessons, and I decided that today was the day to get it done. She's obsessed with cats, so I pulled out a favorite Japanese print that I've been saving for ages to fussy cut a few scraps for the project. I featured one on the flap and the other on a tiny pocket on the back. The blue ticking stripe canvas print makes a soft but sturdy exterior, and I paired it with a matching cream and blue dot print for the lining. A wrist strap on top will hopefully make it a little easier to hold. The hardest thing about this whole project was sewing a bag with such an incredibly narrow opening - just 2 1/2" in diameter - but by going slowly, I was able to do it.

I can't tell you how delightful it was to start and finish a project in one morning. Usually I save my sewing as an incentive for getting my daily work done, but the truth is that there's always more to do than I can finish before bedtime. My days fly by, and I get to the end of them without ever getting around to the reward. I think I'm going to start taking my sewing time in the morning for a while and see what happens. It feels a little naughty, like I'm sneaking dessert right before dinner, but this was just too much fun not to try it again.