I have had some large-print fabrics in my closet for several years. My mother brought them back with her from a trip she took to Alaska. One of the print fabrics was a blue, white, and black print of Wolves. Another print included outdoor wildlife scenes and a third fabric had eagles printed on it. These fabrics seemed to find a semi-permanent place in my fabric stash because I just couldn't quite come up with a good way to use all of the fabrics together to make a cohesive quilt.

In the Fall 2009 issue of Easy Quilts we ran a project called Venetian Dreams which featured 4 different sizes of squares with sashing between the squares to form the larger block. This turned out to be just the pattern I had been looking for to make this Alaska quilt for my parents. I was able to get it all pieced and quilted in time to give it to my parents this Christmas.

If you too have large-print fabrics that you have had a hard time pulling together into a quilt, take a look at the Venetian Dream quilt pattern. As a member of Quilter's Club of America you can view electronic versions of back issue on the website and print out the directions for quilts from these issues.

Enjoy!

Tony (Art Director, Easy Quilts)