The Kittens Quilt | A Seven Year Work in Progress

How old is your oldest work in progress? This is The Kittens Quilt, a pattern by Elizabeth Hartman, and I started it July 5th 2016! For the past couple of years I have been concentrating on finishing old projects, while making new ones as well. I haven’t made much progress, but slow and steady has proven to be the best way I work. I’m using this tracking sheet to keep up with my projects.

When I pulled out this WIP the blocks were in various states of completion. There was a stack of blocks that were 100% done, a few that needed a bit of pressing, and about six that were in pieces.

The thing I love most about pulling out old projects is looking at how my skills have improved over the years. I was a completely different maker seven years ago, and it shows in my piecing. Up until this point, I haven’t had a project that I’ve wanted to rip apart due to the quality of the stitching. So that’s good!

The Kittens Quilt | Construction

Elizabeth Hartman patterns are known for their darling characters and motifs. And for the reputation of having approximately one billion pieces per block. Thankfully The Kittens quilt blocks aren’t the most complicated out there. I have a kit for her Antonia Tiger quilt that I’m avoiding because of all the pieces.

There are 5 different cat quilt blocks in the pattern & their adorable names are: Simon, Chrissy, Bacon Bits, Daisy, and Mr. Snuggles. You only need 12 fat quarters for the blocks. Which means it’s a great pattern to use up those smaller bundles collected over the years.

I learned a valuable lesson while finishing this quilt. In the event that you put away a WIP for a long time, make sure you have all the supplies together. When I put away this project seen years ago, I only put away the block fabrics not the sashing. Because of that, I had to order more Essex Yarn Dyed Linen to finish the quilt.

Of course I did not think that there would be an issue with the colors not being the same, since I ordered the exact same fabric and colorway. But it would seem that dye lots have slightly shifted over the years. The Essex Linen from seven years ago has a warm undertone, and the Essex Linen from today has a cool undertone. You can see it in this IG post. In the long run it doesn’t matter but I found it interesting especially since we assume “basic” fabrics do not change over the years.

The Kittens Quilt | Finishing

The quilting is a basic rectangle grid, I wanted to keep things simple and allow the blocks to stand out more than the quilting. For the thread I used Aurifil 50wt in a purple variegated colorway so it would coordinate with all the purple solids in the quilt.

I pattern matched the backing, you can watch a tutorial on how to here, and did bias binding. Which is 100% the way to go if using a striped fabric because it just looks so good. The very last step, because a quilt is not truly finished until it is labeled, I added a personalized label as well as a Sarah Hearts Made in 2024 label. Emily if you’re reading this, your quilt is finally done!

Quilt Stats

Pattern:
The Kittens Quilt by Elizabeth Hartman
Fabric:
Cat Quilt Blocks – Robert Kaufman Kona Cotton
Background – Robert Kaufman Essex Yarn Dyed Linen
Binding – Tula Pink All Stars Stripe in Foxglove Purple
Backing – Sarah Watts Cat Lady Friskers in Lavender (out of print)
Thread:
Piecing – Aurifil 50wt in Dove #2600
Quilting – Aurifil 50wt in French Lilac #3840