Technique Tuesday with Debby Kratovil: Make that panel shine!

In today's Technique Tuesday post, Debby Kratovil from Debby Kratovil Quilts shows us a fun quilt idea for using fussy-cut blocks from a panel. She's using Matthew's Mini Monsters by Matthew Pridemore--a fun collection of imaginative prints in primary colors. 

Here's Debby! 

Debby, tell us about these fabrics and why you chose to work with them?

Debby: Well, we quilters have fabric stashes that are about 90% "girlie". Flowers, ribbons, bows, pink and sweetness all over the place. When you need to make a quilt for a boy or man, you have to look far and wide for masculine themed fabrics.

I asked Benartex to lead me to something that caters to boys and they sent me these called "Matthew's Mini Monsters." Many of us are familiar with the name Heidi Pridemore. She's been in the professional quilting industry as long as I have (25 years) and I have always like her playful, whimsical style. She is a natural artist and her quilt designs are always joyful.

This collection was designed by her husband! Now, that's a family affair, right?

Matthew's Mini Monsters

The collection includes a panel for a soft book AND this wonderful group of 8 monsters. The squares measure 7-1/2" and for a printed panel, they were very accurate both vertical and horizontal (which almost never happens). I knew I wanted to work with these.

I could have turned this panel into a quick quilt with a border, but that was too easy. Easy is for other quilters; me, I tend to torture myself with details (just kidding!)

Matthew's Mini Monsters panel

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And what did you think of, Debby? Well, I went with my tried and true Tilt Block. There are 8 monster squares and with a 9th square of printed fabric, I could get a 3 x 3 (9 block) quilt center.

If you have a Tri-Recs tool set or the Creative Grids Perfect Rectangle ruler, these are the same angle as my Arrowheads set of 2 rulers. I used my own rectangle ruler (see below) to cut sets of mirror image tilt triangles.

I cut 7-1/2" strips of the various prints. Four triangles pointing in ONE direction for each block. Four triangles pointing in the opposite direction for another block. That's why I have the two fabrics stacked wrong sides together.

These triangles are about 1/4" too large which allows for precision trimming at the end.

Cutting gold triangles and red triangles

' Four red triangles tilt to the left. Four gold triangles tilt to the right.

Now let's see how that works with some blue and orange triangles

Four triangles all pointing the same direction

They all HAVE to point in the same direction to make Squeeky tilt RIGHT.

Four orange triangles aligned with Squeeky, ready to be sewn

The blue triangles tilt the opposite direction for Squeeky's neighbor, Sparky

Blue triangles being sewn to Sparky

Triangles are sewn two by two on opposing sides of the block.

I trimmed a little off of each side, keeping the 1/4" seam allowance around the block

You have to plan your colors and where you want your blocks to appear in relation to each other. Once I knew where my triangle colors would appear, I was then able to cut the triangles based on which direction they would tilt.

Planning where my colors would appear

Sparky and Squeeky sewn, trimmed and ready to be joined to each other.

Sparky and Squeeky tilt in opposite directions.

I incorporated the words from the panel in my outer border. I needed to add some strips of the brown gear fabric to the ends, and it worked!

These blocks finish to 10". I absolutely love that rainbow diagonal stripe (printed diagonally) for the inner border, don't you? It's cut at 1-1/2" wide. Now the center is 33" x 33".

Matthew's Mini Monsters

My borders were cut 4" because that's all I could get out of those word strips. The quilt will be a nice child's size: 40" x 40".

Thanks Debby! 

Come back tomorrow when we'll introduce you to Matthew's entire cast of characters!

Click here to see the entire Matthew's Mini Monsters collection.