Holly Jolly Block of the Week

 Hi friends!

Today I want to share a project I finished recently

that was designed by one of my Instagram friends, Jessica Dayon.

I've collaborated with Jessica before HERE and HERE and I'm

always amazed at her proficiency and creativity!

She is so generous with the number of free patterns and quilt-alongs

she offers and she truly has a great eye for design.

Last year Jessica offered this sampler pattern called the 

Holly Jolly Block of the Week.  She used the Holly Holiday fabric line

by Christopher Thompson for Riley Blake.  The pattern was offered through a free

quilt-along Jessica hosted and the pattern is still available on her blog HERE.

I decided to go a completely different route than Jessica and use blues, creams, and

browns instead of traditional Christmas colors.  I had in my stash, this Nature's Basket 

layer cake by Blackbird Designs for Moda that I wanted to use.  I love seeing how different 

a pattern can look through fabric/color choice!

I also pulled a lot of coordinating fabrics from my stash 

to make it extra scrappy!

I found it helpful to tape the blocks to my wall so I could

determine color placement as I went.  There were so many fabulous

block patterns included in this pattern.  I would love to make full quilts 

out of several of them.

Sampler quilts provide a great opportunity to learn and stretch our skills!

I seriously LOVED making each and every block!

You may have noticed that this flower block is not in the original version of the

Holly Jolly Block of the Week.  I omitted the 3 tree blocks and used this pattern

that an Instagram follower sent me.  She used one of Corey Yoder's flower patterns with my 

Summer Stars block as the center!  I appreciated her sharing the idea with me and 

think it turned out pretty cute!

Two other changes I made to the pattern -

1. I kept the week 6 Peppermint Bark blocks as Pinwheels (not peppermint candies).

2. I enlarged the outer border from 3" finished to a 5" finished border so I could

use up the last of the light blue floral fabric I had in my stash.

I had my awesome quilter, Jen Ostler in Highland, Utah quilt it with an all-over

swirl and feather design called Citrine.  Sometimes I lean towards custom quilting

on a sampler quilt but I think the all-over quilting keeps the focus on

the quilt blocks instead of the quilting.  I'm really happy with the quilting on this.  Thanks Jen!

For the back of my quilt, I used this tan and white plaid fabric that

I received from my grandmother after she passed away.  I love it and

think it's perfect for this quilt!

(I just have to throw in this cute picture of my sweet dog Molly in front of

my Holly Jolly quilt.  She's my little sidekick.)

I absolutely loved making this quilt and I'm so happy

with the way it turned out.  I highly recommend it if you're looking 

for a way to try out lots of different blocks and expand your skills!

Visit Jessica's blog HERE for this free pattern and many more!

Thanks for stopping by today!