Mother's Day Mini Borders

Today, we are working on the borders for the Mother’s Day Mini Challenge!

We challenge you to get this mini quilt done in time for Mother’s Day – it can be for your favorite Mom, or for yourself. I made the sample here on the blog in solids and tone-on-tones, but you can use whatever you have in your scrap bag!

We emailed the center block pattern to our newsletter subscribers last week; this week they got the border instructions.

Can you get the pattern? Yes! If you subscribe to the Poorhouse Post in the month of April (2021), you will get a pattern on the Monday following the date that you subscribed. (Note - if you are reading this after April 2021, the pattern is no longer available).

Let’s take a look at the completed center block. You can take a look at the process in last week's blog post - click here.

Here are our border colors; we are working with light turquoise, yellow, and the white background. Our corner squares will be the dark berry.

For the borders, we are using quarter square triangles, and sewing them together along the bias edges. Because we are cutting large squares in half diagonally in both directions to get our QSTs, let’s stabilize our squares with Mary Ellen’s Best Press. I have better luck with bias edges that way!

Now, let’s cut the diagonals. Line up the 45 degree line along one edge of the block and then align the ruler with the diagonal corners.

You may have noticed that I pressed in center lines of the square, before cutting the diagonal lines. This is optional, but this allows me to see that I am in the center of the block when I cut my diagonal line.

Without moving the fabric, rotate the ruler and use the same process to cut the remaining line for the opposite diagonal.

Now we have quarter square triangles!

To prepare the squares for sewing, we trim the tips off (the width is in the pattern).

Now we can align them accurately for sewing:

Let’s look at the border strip (top view below):

When we add the half square triangles on each end (bottom right above), we are just aligning to the last QST as shown. The pic on the bottom left above shows the completed border strips.

Here are all of the strips sewn together, with the corner squares added:

And here is the finished mini quilt top!

Simple and scrappy! We will be quilting next week, so stay tuned - you can get a gift done early for Mother’s Day!

To spice it up a bit, we are going having a fun giveaway. If you are a Poorhouse Post subscriber, you are already entered. We have a set of charm squares of Shadow Blush (42-5” squares), and a pack of Kaffe Fassett Collective (5” pack Citrus). I will be picking 2 winners. Our giveaway is limited to US residents only.

(I will add the winners from last week’s giveaway to that post when they are confirmed).

You can increase your chances of winning by posting a pic of your block and tagging Poorhouse Quilt Designs on either Facebook or Instagram!

Our email subscribers received the pattern for the center block of the quilt shown above in their inbox today. We will be sending out the border info next week. It’s not too late to get the pattern, just subscribe to our email during April 2021! To subscribe, enter your info in the box at the right --->!

If you subscribe, you will get a pattern on the Monday following the date that you subscribed. (Note - if you are reading this after April 2021, the pattern is no longer available).

Thanks so much for reading and I hope you have a great week!

-Kris