729 3 1/2 inch squares....would I do it again?
 

I have been doing charity quilts recently. In fact, about 90% of my fabric is for charity quilts. My husband has a couple of times said, "where's mine?" while I've been quilting.

I'd alway ask him what color quilt he wanted. He never answered me. So what's a wife to do? Especially if he's the kind of guy that does nothing but work. Doesn't play golf, fish, hunt, read, etc. He only works!

I was on pinterest and saw a QR code quilt. For those that don't know what a QR code is it's that 1 inch black and white square you see on packages. If you use a bar scanner it will give you information, take you to a web site, or have a message.

I decided to do him a QR code quilt with the message being "I love you George!". I decided instead of black and white I'd do a dark blue and white. Went to a QR code creator and typed the message it and it came back with the code. I then drew lines to make a grid. Bought 4 yards of white and 4 yards of dark blue.

Started cutting out 729 3 1/2 inch squares! 410 White and 319 blue. I double, triple and quadtruple checked my rows as I went. I sewed 6 rows together and then 7 rows. Then sewed both of those together. Then I did 2 sections of 7 rows and sewed those together and then sewed the 13 rows and 14 rows together. Only thing I would do differently is iron the sections before sewing them. Was too big to iron after the top was completed.

I used a different blue design fabric for the backing. Knowing I was going to have to piece the backing I took some of the leftover squares and made one row and sewed it between both pieces.

OH!!! I forgot to tell you I was making this on a Bernina 440QE that only has a 7 1/2 inch harp! The quilt measures something like 81 inches by 81 inches! I quilted the quilt on my machine. I started in the top right hand square and quilted to the bottom left hand square and then turned the quilt and started in the square next to the first one. And sewed down the squares without any stitching (make sense)

After giving it to my husband he was quite pleased. He's head of an off shore banking software development company and sent a photo of the quilt to see if they could figure out what it said. One of his guys used his phone and scanned it and it worked!!!

Next time, if there is a next time, I'll definitely make the squares smaller!

Thanks for looking!!!

I think that is the most clever quilt I have ever seen.

If you click on the photo (sorry it's so large) it will take you to a smaller photo and you'll be able to scan it.

You are one brave and creative person. Love it but understand the machine quilting part was probably daunting. Great work!!! Very appropriate for your husband because of his occupation.

What a clever idea!

I'm glad he liked it. :)

What a great idea! Love it!

Quilting Haven it was very daunting!! I started quilting it about 5ish on Saturday evening, worked until about midnight or so. Got up went to church and lunch and came home about 1ish and started quilting it again. Totally finished it about 9 or 9:30 Sunday night.

Next time I'll do it a tad different. Iron the sections as I go and not wait until it's one big top, use a much lighter shade of gray to piece it or use white, and make it SMALLER!!! But with it being 81 x 81 it's big enough to tuck his feet in. My husband stands right at 6 ft tall.

Thanks everyone for the kind words!

+1
I totally agree!
Just charming.

nicely done

Holy Moly Batman.....that is so unique and different.....Great Job