“Chevies on the Levee” Alternate Piecing and Cutting Method

My son and daughter-in-law gave me a “Jellie” roll from JoAnns for Christmas. The roll of fabric contained 20 batik strips, 2 each of 10 different colors. This gift was perfect for a chevron quilt design idea I’ve had “on the back burner” for several weeks.

Chevron quilts are quite popular among modern quilters just now. I made mine the easy way with rectangular “bricks” instead of diamonds or half square triangles. To make sure my cutting technique was viable, I experimented with colored computer drawings.

First I designed and printed the stairstep diagram, then cut it apart just as I planned to cut apart the quilt. I taped it together and made the second cut and taped it together again. Satisfied that the cutting technique would yield the results I envisioned, I began to sew and cut the fabric.

I sewed each batik strip to a white-on-white strip. I pressed the seams toward the batiks and cross-cut into segments. Measurements are given in the Sept./Oct. 2014 issue of McCall’s Quilting.

Referring to my stairstep computer drawing, I arranged the square units on my design wall. I substituted blue batik squares for the black squares in my computer drawing.

Notice the blue squares. Once the quilt top was sewn together, I cut the quilt, diagonally, through these squares. In the finished quilt, the blue becomes the setting triangles all around the edge of the quilt. I guarded against stretching the bias edges by stay-stitching prior to cutting. Look closely at the picture below to see a drawn chalk line and two machine stitched lines on both sides of the drawn line.

I made the first cut from the bottom left corner diagonally upwards. This created a large patchwork triangle – the lower right portion of the quilt.

I moved the large patchwork triangle straight up and sewed it to the top of the quilt.

The second cut is through the chain of blue squares, upwards from right to left. This creates a large, patchwork triangle on the upper right. Now move the triangle on the right to the far left of the patchwork on the left (this becomes the bottom of the quilt); sew the 2 pieces together.