Patchwork, Please! :: The Polka-Dot-Cafe Apron

There was a time years ago when I took a part-time job. On my first day, I slipped on the apron I was given and thought to myself, "This is a dream come true." For the next 8 years, I worked as a pastry chef. Which in that quaint little town meant I baked pies, tarts, cakes, brownies, and the like. My work bench was in front of a picture window, there where industrial ovens a few feet behind me, and a tall Hobart stand mixer on the floor to my side. Bins under my bench held bags of flours and sugars, which I dipped into continuously throughout my shift. And just steps out my door were walk-in refrigerators that kept my butter and eggs and more. Every day, my "office" was full of good smells, and tasted even better.  And as I thought of this week's project, these memories of my time in the bakery came rushing back, and it dawned on me. I needed to make a baker's apron.

I took the easy way out by purchasing one just like the ones I used to wear when I baked. I'd never had one since, and I confess I always loved how they felt on, how the long strings wrapped around to tie in front. If I had it to do over, I might have enlarged the blocks for the pocket just a tad. But those blocks - well I really enjoyed them! I don't have many fussy-cuttable prints in my stash apparently, so I decided to use a fq stack of Jeni Baker's "Color Me Retro." What happy fabric! There were basically three palettes, which worked great using one for each pocket. I did fussy cut the large squares, and added in one coordinating stash fabric per block.

Instead of using templates, I opted to use my rotary equipment - cutting 2 1/2" Big Squares (and actually 5, not 4 as written, 1 being the center motif) and 1 1/2" Small Squares. For the Corner Triangles, I cut 2-2 1/2" squares, then cut them in half diagonally, and similarly, for the Small Triangles, I cut 4-2" squares, again cutting in half diagonally. In doing it "my way," my blocks, trimmed, were slightly smaller than Ayumi's, measuring 6 1/4".

I didn't have twill on hand and opted to back my block strip with pellon's Thermolam Plus 971F, a nice basic fusible quilting interfacing. And quilt I did - simply, in diagonals through the center of each block. I backed it with another piece of "Retro" (the large teal and green flowers), and I then followed the binding instructions, though I did the final stitching by machine.

All in all, I thoroughly enjoyed these blocks, this fabric, indeed every step of this project. And don't you doubt it. Pretty or not, this apron is going to get used!

Project adapted from Patchwork, Please!: Colorful Zakka Projects to Stitch and Give as part of the Zakka 2.0 :: Patchwork, Please sew along. Linking with Finish it up Friday.