Black & White Paradigm Shift Quilt Completed

Here is the completed black and white 'half/and half' blocks Christmas quilt top. 

The pattern is called "Paradigm Shift"and is from the May/ June 2010 issue of McCalls Quilting magazine pg. 54. 

It has 42  mock log cabin blocks, 8 5/8 inch size with a 2 inch black inner border and a 5 inch wide outer brown & black border. Finished quilt top size: 66' x 75". 

The border looks quite dark in this photo, but the second photo shows the detail. The fabric has a chocolate brown background with black swirls on it. I'm quite pleased by the total effect! This is not a difficult quilt to make, but I think it looks more complicated than it is. 

The next step will be to wash the back fabric, iron it, cut it, and then sew it together to the appropriate size.  The back fabric needs to extend about 3 inches beyond the size of the quilt top on all 4 sides. The batting in the middle should be approximately the same.  If you quilt them with a lot of quilt lines close together ( for instance with 'stippling' ) you may need more. In my experience of quilting most blocks 'in the ditch' ( following the existing seam lines on the blocks) and then free motion quilting the borders, I have found that 3 inches of extra back fabric and batting is sufficient, but then you have to be careful to lay your top, batting and backing down exactly on top of each other when you pin them together.

But before I started on the above part of this quilt, I got the bug to try another baby quilt, this time made up of leftover scraps.....