Have you ever caught a bug and kept it in a jar? It’s fun to see a lightning bug flash or a caterpillar turn into a butterfly! But then you have to let them go. Here is a quilt block pattern so you can keep it forever.
I need to tell you a little story about this quilt block. Before the Quiltbus, I owned an online shop called HickoryHill Quilts. We were the second Quilt Shop to go online, after Pine Tree Quiltworks of Maine. The internet was new (this was 1997) and most people didn’t have computers. So fabric that was sold by mail was generally done by catalog. Y’all may remember getting the Keepsake Quiltings catalog back in the day.
I decided I would get around this by creating a fat eighths club. I would send members a fat eighth (11″ x 18″) piece of fabric for every new fabric that came into the shop. It was a small but fun club. People would send me pictures of what they made with the fabric and I would share them on rec.crafts.textiles.quilting newsgroup forum. One woman came up with a very ingenious block:
The Bug Jar Quilt Block
I’m sorry, I don’t remember her name. I did hear later on the forum that she had passed away. (If you know, please remind me.) She never really got to see how that block exploded. For a while, *everyone* was doing bug jar blocks – wine bottles, baby food jars, fish bowls, mason jars, soda bottles, jam jars – you name it. It was really fun to see all the varieties.
I honestly don’t remember much about her original block, other than it used an 11″ x 18″ piece of fabric. I think I have reproduced her block correctly, but if you were a member back then and I got it wrong, please let me know.
So without further ado, here is the pattern.
You will need:
- (1) 11″ x 16-1/2″ piece of Bees fabric
- (4) 4″ squares sky background fabric
- (2) 2-1/2″ x4″ sky background fabric
- (1) 2-1/2″ x 4″ bottle top fabric
Draw a diagonal line on the back of the (4) 4″ sky fabric squares. This will be your sewing line.
Place a sky square in each corner of the bug fabric block, right sides together, so the diagonal line intersects each edge. Sew on the line. Flip it over the seam and press. If it matches the corner exactly, you can trim the underside to 1/4″.
Making the Jar Lid
Sew a 2-1/2″ x 4″ sky background rectangle to each side of the 2-1/2″ x 4″ bottle top rectangle using a 1/4″ seam. Press to the bottle top rectangle.
Sew the bottle top unit to the bug jar unit. Press. You have made a bug jar! It should measure 11″ x 16-1/2″.
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