I like playing board games (my mom does too, but she doesn’t play much when I’m not visiting). My mom likes quilting (I prefer different types of sewing projects, but I’m generally pro-crafts so we good). When I went home to Arizona for Christmas last month, the weather was unusually cold and wet for the area- so what else were we to do? We played a few games of Patchwork and made a real life quilt from one of the results.

STEP ONE: MAKE YOUR PATTERN

The first part of making this particular pattern is the most fun part- you get to play a few rounds of Patchwork! Just keep playing until your quilt looks good and cute and doesn’t have too many holes in it (obviously it’s going to have some holes. We’re Not Playing to Win). I took a picture of the winning game board, but also drew out my own version on graph paper. This let me:

1. Break each quilty Tetris piece into its composite squares (real quilts are made from smaller, more regular shaped pieces)

2. Helped me keep track of which fabrics I picked out and where they would all eventually go. I tried to draw them in the pattern but I am not that kind of artist so maybe don’t look too close?



Picking the fabric was its own little adventure. The prints in the actual game aren’t actually very exciting, so I quickly decided that I’d aim for fabrics with similar colors or shapes, but didn’t need to match them too exactly. Star Wars fabric exists, you guys. Uwe clearly wasn’t thinking about that when he designed this game. I picked up a few little pieces from the local fabric store but most of the fabrics in this quilt came from my generous mother who let me raid her stash (a small portion of which is pictured above). She has what many quilters would call a SABLE, or Stash Acquired Beyond Life Expectancy. It’s impressive, and there’s some good stuff in there.

STEP TWO: CUT AND ARRANGE FABRIC SQUARES



We used a ruler and rotary cutter to cut the fabric into 6.5″ squares (so they’ll be 6″ after they’re sewn together). We then laid them out in the correct arrangement and stacked them in columns so they’re all waiting in the right order to get sewn together.



Mini sub step: *Appliqué*

I didn’t want to leave any literal holes in the quilt, so we came up with another idea for the blank spaces that were left on the game board. The board itself is a mottled green color (yes, there are two boards in the game and only one is green but it is the only one I have ever used. Ever). My mom has a nice collection of fabrics that she has hand-dyed, so we picked a pretty green one to match the exposed board and added a nice “-2” to it as a reminder of the two points you lose for every unfilled space. This maintains your shame without compromising the structural integrity of the quilt. THAT’S IMPORTANT.

We did this step before stacking the squares; it’s easiest to sew on those decorations before piecing the whole thing together.

STEP THREE: SEW IT ALL TOGETHER, ALREADY





First you sew a bunch of strips, then you sew the strips together. Before you know it, you have a full 9×9 quilt top! There is some method of witchcraft where you sew everything in the right order, so you get all the rows completed but the spare threads hold them all together in the correct order and make it extra easy to sew the rows together. I did it, but I still don’t understand it. Read a quilting blog or something, it was neat.

STEP FOUR: HIGHLIGHT YOUR VICTORIES

In the game Patchwork, the first person to completely fill a 7×7 square gets 7 extra points. I EARNED THOSE. So we did some extra appliqué work to write 7×7 on the quilt, and then I sewed a bright green trim around the 7×7 area to highlight my glory.

STEP FIVE: LET YOUR GERIATRIC DOG PEE ON THE QUILT

It’s okay, Mr. Wilson is old. He can’t see and he just wants to stand on the quilt. He’s being cute and won’t cause any trouble. Maybe he’ll take a little nap. Oh wait, no. He’s peeing? Oh no no no no no no.

You can’t wash that until it’s all done. It will unravel. Hang it up to dry and complete the additional steps knowing that it’s a pee pee quilt. Pat Mr. Wilson on the head and scratch his ears. He’s 16 and can’t help it.

STEP SIX: THE ACTUAL QUILTING PART

The term “quilting” specifically refers to sewing through all the layers of a quilt: the pieced together top, a backing, and the squishy comfy middle layer, called batting. To put everything together, we cut out a large back piece the same size as top, another piece of batting, and then sewed everything together inside out. Flip it the right way around and then sew around the edge and it looks nice! There are other, fancier ways to finish the edges as well, but I’m a newbie quilter.



For the quilting, I then sewed through all of the layers in straight lines, just following the rows and columns of the top. There are other, fancier ways to do the quilting step, but I’m a newbie quilter.

STEP SEVEN: FINISHING TOUCHES

GOOD NEWS! You can do all of these after you’ve washed your quilt and gotten rid of all the dog pee! Sew buttons in the places they’re pictured on your finished game board. Buttons lead to victory, so sew them on with pride. The buttons I found are large, but not to scale of the ones in the game. That’s fine with me, I don’t think the quilt would be as snuggly with giant plate-sized buttons.



My mom makes a lot of quilts as gifts, often for important life events (weddings, new babies, etc). For these quilts she usually adds a little hand written fabric label to the back with a little blurb about who it’s for, the event, when she made it, etc. I asked her to write this once since I don’t like my handwriting that much, and then I hand sewed it onto the back of the quilt.

STEP EIGHT: NAPTIME YES