The Story Behind Magic Add-a-Strip Quilts

Wow, it is hard believe that my fifth book is being released by C&T Publishing. Having books published, traveling, and teaching has been a delight, as has meeting new people, sharing my love of quilting tips and techniques with others, and learning new things from other quilters.

This newest book, Magic Add-A-Strip Quilts, came about by watching my mother piece a quilt. Though the technique she used was not a inch strip, it gave me the idea to make quilts with inch strips inserted into different block layout shapes.

Picture of myself and my mother.

The quilts in this new book are made with squares, right-angle triangles, 60° diamonds, or odd shapes. The shape is sliced and a 1˝ strip is inserted, resulting in blocks that can be used in many ways

My sisters and daughters helped in the process as well. They each chose a block pattern from my book and made their own quilt in a different layout or resized the block or came up with their own layout. Here are some samples of my quilts, followed by their versions of the quilt.

My quilt Who Spilt the Crayons.

Polly's quilt Polygon Patchwork: Polly's quilt is resized and pieced in a different color way.

My quilt Argyle.

Cheryl's quilt Summer Skies: Cheryl has added sashing between her blocks.

For quilters who enjoy a little bit more of a challenge there is the Twilight Table Runner.

A mini sewing retreat with my sisters and mother each working on their quilts for Magic Add-A-Strip Quilts.