Seaside Stitches: Old Italian Quilt

Julia finished the Old Italian quilt for her boyfriend, Fred, on Monday. She did such a great job! We enjoyed the process using Anita Grossman Solomon's techniques from Rotary Cutting Revolution. She can't wait to show the quilt to Anita in a few weeks when she visits Ninigret Quilters!

Most of the prints came from the Big 10" Charm Swap. For the first round, back in May 2012, we swapped manly prints. It was fun (for me!) trying to match up prints that worked well together.

Julia wanted to maximize the 10" squares to make larger blocks than in Anita's instructions, so we had to tweak the dimensions a little. These blocks finished at 7-3/4". (Julia was not happy with that. She prefers nice round numbers, but we couldn't squeeze another 1/4" out of them.)

The blocks in the center of the quilt incorporate Army prints.

She used a piece of Army camo for the label. Fred wears a lot of plaid flannel, so that's what she chose for the back. It is one heavy, warm quilt! You can almost see the argyle pattern created on the back from quilting in the ditch.

After an 18-hour drive to South Carolina with his family, Julia presented the quilt to her Army boy today during Family Day. Tomorrow is boot camp graduation, then they will head home. While he finishes college and ROTC, Fred will be a musician in the National Guard band.