Whip up a quick and classic four-patch quilt with this fun fat quarter-friendly pattern from Fat Quarter Shop!
In the past when I’ve worked with Fat Quarter Shop the patterns have all been a step out of my comfort zone, like the half-rectangle triangles in the Black Diamonds quilt or any of the tiny piecing in their free Halloween sew-alongs. But not this time!
I decided to give my overwhelmed mom brain a break and signed up for this beginner-friendly fat quarter pattern where the smaller piece I have to touch is a 3″ square.
It didn’t hurt that this is my favorite type of quilt, where one fat quarter makes one (giant) block! It makes the really easy to resize without having to do a bunch of math.
I’ll never understand why someone who struggles with numbers as much as I do decided that quilting was the best option for a hobby, but here we are…
As for the fabric, I knew I wanted something that would really make use of the large squares. One of my favorite designers, Sweetfire Road, had just come out with the Evermore collection featuring mustard yellow, tiny strawberries, and delightful greens that I knew would be perfect.
The pattern calls for 20 fat quarters for the blocks along with 1 1/3 yards of accent fabric. The bundle I chose has 32 fat quarters so I knew I’d have more than enough fabric just from the bundle.
I never use a lot of white in my quilts (there is a reason the word ‘chicken’ is in my site name!) but I thought I could get away with using the white FQs in the bundle for the accent color.
In the end, I used 5 different fat quarters for my accent squares and I love the resulting scrappy look.
If you prefer to buy yardage for the accent color you’ll need 1 1/3 yards of fabric. While you’re picking out the yardage grab your backing ( 4 3/4 yards) and binding (3/4 yard).
For me, the binding was a no-brainer, I love using a stripe for my bindings and I picked the Evermore Honey Hand Stitched Yardage. It’s a bit lighter in color than I normally go but I couldn’t pass up the beautiful mustard color!
Picking out the backing was a bit harder. My go-to is always to use the darkest version of the main print (again 4 dogs, 2 kids and one cat + a barnyard full of poultry make that choice easy!) but I wasn’t feeling that much floral so I went with Evermore Fern Strawberry Tangle Yardage instead.
What can I say? Those little strawberries have me in a chokehold!
If you’re not feeling the cottagecore vibes you’re still in luck because this quilt will be amazing in any fabric. It has a classic charm that would work well in flannels, florals, polka dots, Christmas, or really just about anything.
Fat Quarter Shop is currently offering a kit made with Main Street by Sweetwater along with a separate backing kit which takes all the guesswork out of making this quilt.
As for the pattern itself, it’s a great one to keep in your back pocket for a last-minute gift, especially if you happen to have a stash of fat quarter bundles waiting for the right project.
You can make this quilt in a day (ask me how I know) but I recommend spacing it out over a weekend or even longer.
The cutting and construction are both simple and forgiving, you even have enough wiggle room to do some fussy cutting on your fat quarters if you’re careful!
Most of my favorite blocks featured the stitched stripes, even though they took a bit more brain power to keep everything facing the right way! Not all patterns play nicely with directional fabric but this one really does.
When I got to laying out my blocks I ended up settling on a repeat of yellow, pink, green, yellow pink, green. Using a 3-unit repeat on a 4×5 quilt gives you a good diagonal look.
Of course, I ended up with an extra green and down a pink so I fudged it a little at the end but I still love her!
If you’d like to make your own you can get the free Fat Quarter Four Patch pattern from Fat Quarter Shop where you can also pick up the kit or grab your own bundle of Evermore to recreate my quilt!
Check out my Quilting page for more info or start here:
