21. Spirals and Echoes in a Drunkards Path Block

by LeahDay · Published May 26, 2014 · Updated May 19, 2022

It’s the last week of May so we’re quilting our last Cheater Drunkard’s Path Block! This time we’re stitching it up a notch with spirals and echoes:

After making three of these blocks and seeing all the amazing design variations on the BBQA Facebook Group, I’m really excited to see what everyone will do with this block too.

If you’re just getting started in this group, remember you can find all the posts, videos, and extra tip articles right here.

Between Josh and I, we’ve now posted over 6 hours of videos to the Building Blocks Playlist! You can go to Youtube, click on the playlist and each video will automatically play in order they were posted.

Speaking of videos, let’s watch this week’s video to see how to quilt this cool design:

Ready to jump into the fun of this quilt project? All you need is a copy of the Building Blocks Quilt Pattern!

Click Here to check out the PRINT version

Click here to check out the DOWNLOAD version

Anytime is a great time to join in this quilt along! The videos will stay online forever, so you’ll always have a visual guide for how to piece and free motion quilt every block.

Check out all the fun blocks we’ve learned so far in this Quilt Along!

When it comes to quilting this last design in your Cheater Drunkard’s Path Block, the main goal is keeping your echoes evenly spaced in the quarter circle corners, and also carefully quilting the lines of the spiral between.

I left the center spiral shape for very last so I could stitch inside, then break thread right in the center of the spiral. If this doesn’t quite work out for you, remember there’s 100 ways to quilt this block and ALL of them are right! So even if you have to break thread a few times, or do some extra travel stitching to hit all the lines of echoes, that’s just fine.

Josh will be joining in the fun tomorrow with his take on this fun block, so make sure to swing by tomorrow to see his video.

Let’s go quilt,

Leah Day

Tags: building blocks quilt pattern cheater drunkards path leah day quilting quilting lesson spirals

LeahDay

Leah Day has been teaching online since 2009. She's the creator of the Free Motion Quilting Project, a blog filled with thousands of quilting tutorial videos. Leah has written several books including 365 Free Motion Quilting Designs, Explore Walking Foot Quilting with Leah Day, and Mally the Maker and the Queen in the Quilt.

Grace says:

May 27, 2014 at 6:22 pm

Cheater cloth for practice FM 42blocks in one yard!!! How much??
I got the book

Reply
Leah Day says:

May 27, 2014 at 6:23 pm

Hi Grace – You actually need 3 yards of the Spoonflower fabric to get all 42 blocks. If you already have the pattern you might find it cheaper to just mark the block quilting designs on plain fabric to practice.

Reply
Grace says:

May 29, 2014 at 12:38 am

Ok thank u I may go to Joanne fabrics store n cotton fabrics 3 yards of white colors
Only ?? But how much to need yard for like 2 colors??
I can't wait to practice lololololol
I love your videos
U are amazing talents wow!!!
Maria ( Grace)

Reply
Leah Day says:

May 29, 2014 at 12:41 am

For practice blocks? To cut all 42 – 10 inch squares you'll need around 3.5 yards of fabric. To do 2 colors you'll need around 1 3/4 yard of each color.

To follow the pattern however, you'll need more fabric to cut the blocks. In that case, check the material list in the pattern. http://www.leahday.com/shop/product/building-blocks-printed-quilt-pattern/

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Grace says:

May 29, 2014 at 9:57 am

Thank uuuuu
Tmw I'm going to Joanne fabrics store smile
Maria

Reply
Susan Loretta says:

July 17, 2014 at 12:59 am

I'm curious as to why you did not start at the center of the spiral and work OUT from there, rather then doing all the other quilting and working IN.

Reply

21. Spirals and Echoes in a Drunkards Path Block

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