Pebbled Prairie QAL Week 2: Color A Nine Patches

Welcome to Week 2 of the Pebbled Prairie Quilt-Along!  This is my favorite week in any quilt-along, or in any quilt project really: the week we start to sew the fabrics together!

I have all my squares cut out and today I'm going to show you my easy method for randomizing fabric placement and keeping all the pieces in the right places when sewing them together in nine patch blocks.  

The secret is the answer key in the back of a Sudoku puzzle book!

First, arrange your squares into nine equal piles and number them.  Each individual fabric should only be in one pile, but it's ok if one pile has multiple fabrics in it.  For example, my pile 4 has a mix of three fabrics so the bird fabric will not be in every 9-patch.  But, if I had the bird fabric in two different piles, then the bird would appear twice in the same 9-patch.

Once the fabric is sorted, choose four squares from any answer key (I drew a pink box around the ones I was using) and lay out your fabrics, matching the numbers of the fabric to the numbers in the answer key.  I labeled the top row of squares to help you visualize what this looks like.  Using the Sudoku book ensures that each fabric only appears once in each row and column.

After the squares are laid out, it's time to use web piecing to keep everything organized.  But remember, the goal here is making everything look random, so if a few squares switch places during the sewing process it isn't a big deal!  For this part, we are going to label the columns that we laid out 1-6.

Chain piece the blocks in columns 1 and 2 together, but do not cut them apart.  Move them to your ironing station and lay the strip horizontally with the top of the column to your right.

Press every other block up, then flip the remaining blocks up and press them down.  The third picture shows what the wrong side of the fabric should look like after pressing - ironing the pieces in an alternating pattern means the seams will nest when the rows are sewn together.  Repeat the chain piecing and ironing to sew columns 4 and 5 together.

Sew column 3 to column 2 and press in the same way, then repeat to sew column 6 to column 5.  Pressing the "down" seams is a little trickier in this step, but the end result is worth it to lock all the squares into place.  Because we want to end up with 9-patches at the end of the piecing, the next step is to cut each column section in half at the middle.

Without cutting any more rows apart, fold the top row over and match up the seams - they will nest for you because of how the pressing was done earlier.  Sew the top row to the middle row and press as desired.

Repeat until all four 9-patches are sewn together, then place these four off to the side together so they remain as a group for next week's step.

And that's it!  The Sudoku book makes it easy to randomize the squares and the web piecing keeps all the pieces organized.  Choose another answer key and get to work on the next set of random 9-patches.  If your layout has the offset blocks in it, you can use two squares of the answer key to piece two 9-patches at once.  Web piecing works with any size block - just keep sewing columns and rows until you have the whole block in place.  I used this method with 25-patch blocks when I was sewing my postage stamp quilt together.

And there you have it - the easy way to make random 9-patches.  Let me know if you have any questions and remember to tag me @bluepipdesigns on Instagram when you post your progress to make sure I see it!  Still need a copy of the pattern?  It's available in my pattern shop now!