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After more than a year of cutting, piecing, and sewing, we're finally at the end of the quilt along! (You can see all of the individual blocks and read more about the original idea here.) This pattern was by no means simple---12 block templates, 12 appliqué templates and little written instruction---but we made it! Thank you to everyone who stuck with it and completed the pattern.

I'm excited to finally reveal my completed quilt with you! I opted to arrange my blocks in a different layout than the one suggested in the pattern, mainly because I wanted to make sure fabrics were dispersed across the quilt, and not clumped in one area. 

After I hand-appliquéd the solid black strips of fabric, I quilted the entire top with a large grid.

I then went back in and added some hand-quilting in the upper left hand corner using black sashiko thread.

The quilt is backed with Carolyn Friedlander's Doe Wide, and machine bound with a graph-paper print I've had for many years. 

I'm really happy with how this quilt turned out---it was hard to envision what it would look like while only doing one block each month---and am so glad to have taken this challenge on. Thank you for all following along!

Now is the chance to celebrate you and all of your hard work! I've teamed up with Zakka Workshop and Pintuck & Purl (two awesome New England businesses!) to create a prize pack, which will be awarded to someone who has completed this quilt. Here's what's up for grabs:

• a copy of 318 Patchwork Patterns by Kumiko Fujita
• a bundle of all of the other patterns by Yoshiko Jinzenji
• a mini charm pack of Denyse Schmidt's Modern Solids
• a pack of 1" hexagons for English paper piecing
• a fabric bundle which includes Maze and Vale panels and a cut of Yoshiko Jinzenji fabric

To be in the running for this excellent prize pack, please link up to your completed quilt, following the instructions below. The link-up will remain open until next Tuesday, November 1 at 11:59 pm EST. I'll then pull a winner, at random, from all of the entries, and will announce the winner on Wednesday, November 2. I can't wait to see your quilts, and good luck! 

UPDATE 11/3/16: A huge congratulations to everyone that finished their Modern Sampler Quilts. The results are amazing! And a special congratulations to Debbie, from A Quilter's Table, whose name was selected at random to receive the prize pack. Thanks again to all that participated!

HOW TO LINK UP

1. Click the "Add your link" button below, and link to a blog post or Instagram photo of your completed Modern Sampler Quilt. In the "Link Title" field, enter your blog name or Instagram handle.

2. If you're linking to a blog post, please link back to this post somewhere in your post. If you're linking to an Instagram photo, be sure to tag your photo with the hashtag #modernsamplerquiltalong.

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The Modern Sampler Quilt Along is an informal and virtual quilt along where we make a block from Yoshiko Jinzenji's Modern Sampler Quilt pattern each month. You can follow the hashtag #modernsamplerquiltalong on Instagram to get a peek at everyone's blocks, fabrics, and progress, as we work our way through the pattern together. All are welcome to join the quilt along at any point! Each month, we gather here to share the blocks we've made; in September we began putting together our quilt tops and appliquéing strips to them.  

It's our second-to-last link-up! How are your quilt tops coming together? Are you enjoying the process of appliquéing the final strips to your tops? 

My quilt has been basted, quilted and bound---but!---I'm not ready to reveal the finished piece with you quite yet. I'd like to go back in and add in some lines of hand quilting, so you'll have to come back at the end of the month to see the entire quilt in all its finished glory.

Our final link-up will open on Tuesday, October 25, and will remain open for one week, closing on Tuesday, November 1. During that week, I hope that all of you that have stuck with me this past year, making blocks and encouraging each other on, will stop by and post photos of your finished quilts. I can't wait to see all of them! Once the link-up closes, I'll select a winner at random who will receive an excellent prize pack, which I'm pulling together now. Any questions? Please let me know!

In the meantime, let's see your in-progress quilts! Feel free to share a photo of your completed top, a detail of your appliqué, or your backing and binding fabric choices. 

HOW TO LINK UP

1. Click the "Add your link" button below, and link to a blog post or Instagram photo of your in-progress quilt. In the "Link Title" field, enter your blog name or Instagram handle.

2. If you're linking to a blog post, please link back to this post somewhere in your post. If you're linking to an Instagram photo, be sure to tag your photo with the hashtag #modernsamplerquiltalong.

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When creating new quilts, one of my favorite things to do is to choose a traditional block design and experiment with its scale, color placement, and layout. For the spring quilt collection, I played around with the log cabin quilt block and created two distinct quilts. 

For the first, this baby quilt, I decided to go big and enlarged the block so that it featured only one quilt block. The log cabin's center (a Denyse Schmidt print from her Hope Valley line), is surrounded by wide eggplant and cream "logs."

I really love how this particular layout creates such a bold and graphic design, while also highlighting the grid quilting.

For the second design, this larger throw-size quilt, I created 12 log cabin blocks in a restricted, all-solids, palette. By arranging the blocks as I did, a secondary pattern of floating shapes emerged. 

I also chose to vary the fabrics I used in the logs, so there is a mix of cream and white, and various shades of purple, red, and plum, within each of the blocks, which I really love. I always love to opt for a bit of variation over uniformity!

What's your favorite log cabin quilt layout? Here are a few others from the archives, in case you'd like to see:

Fields and Furrows 

All photos by Joyelle West. Shop all quilts here (and enjoy free domestic shipping!).