Minecraft Quilt - Part 1

I don't know much about Minecraft...except that all the little men in my life are into it...and one particular little man needs a new quilt for his bed. Because it's all pixels, creating a pattern on graph paper would be easy enough, but a quick google search led me to one someone else had already created and generously shared.

http://slightlyoffquilter.com/pixel-quilt/

Score! The only thing that looked particularly bothersome was keeping all the little squares in the right place while sewing them together. I'd seen this technique on YouTube and a block like this seemed like a perfect use for it.

First, I cut a 20" square of fusible interfacing. I make a lot of t-shirt quilts and prefer the lightest weight (and least expensive) kind you can buy for those...so that's what I used for this. In hindsight, something a little thicker would have been better but it worked out okay.

One side is bumpy (the adhesive side) and the other side is smoothe. I drew a 2-1/2" grid on the smoothe side. Eight across and eight down. 

**Sidenote...there is such thing as fusible interfacing with a 1" grid already printed on it...but it's about $4/yd...and it's marked every 1"...and I needed the lines on the 1/2"...so I decided not to spend the extra money**

Next I cut a gazillion 2-1/2" squares using a variety of shades of green. All the blocks in this quilt use several shades of each color, so I'm using pre-cuts of Kona solids that I ordered from Missouri Star Quilt Company...my favorite online quilt shop.

On the bumpy side of the interfacing, I arranged the eyes and mouth first, then filled in the rest of the squares randomly with several shades of greens.

Next I ironed them all in place. See my big square ironing surface? MUCH easier than trying to use my regular ironing board. I made this just for this project but I think it'll come in handy for lots of things. It's just a 24" square piece of 1/2" plywood covered in two layers of batting with fabric on top. Very handy!

After I ironed it all down, I flipped it over and gave it a good press on the back for good measure.

Now comes the fun part. I folded over one row at a time, using my drawn lines as my guide, and sewed down all the vertical rows with a quarter inch seam allowance.

Here it is all stitched together one direction.

Next, I clipped the seams being careful not to clip through the stitching.

Then I sewed down the horizontal lines, making sure the intersecting seam allowances lay flat.

Gave it a good press from the back...

And voila! It's a Creeper (or so I'm told).

And  there's Lava...

And a Zombie...

And more to come...I'm on a roll!