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Benni Harper Mystery Lesson 12: Delectable Mountains

quilt designs by Andrea Bishop

Many quilts draw their inspiration from spiritual sources. Found as far back in quilting history as the 1840s, the Delectable Mountains pattern has a long tradition of being connected to John Bunyan's allegory Pilgrim's Progress. In the story, the Delectable Mountains were filled with beautiful gardens, orchards, vineyards, and fountains of water. From the mountains' heights, the searching pilgrims could see the gates of Celestial City. The pattern is often made with bias set squares turned to form a triangular design that is suggestive of mountain peaks. It is considered one of the most identifiable American quilt patterns. Similar in design to Kansas Troubles and Indian Trail, variations of it have been called World's Fair and Solomon's Temple.

Start the Delectable Mountains project

1. Open EQ5.
2. Click the Create a New Project tab (it appears immediately when you open EQ5).
   OR
   On the FILE menu, choose New.
3. Type: Benni-Mountains.
4. Click OK.

Getting the LeMoyne Star Block from the Library

5. At the top of your screen, click LIBRARIES > Block Library > 1 Classic Pieced > Eight-Point Stars.
6. Find the "Diamond block" and click it to select it.
7. Click the Copy button.
8. Click Close to put the library away.

Setting up the Quilt

12. At the top of your screen, click WORKTABLE > Work on Quilt.
13. Click QUILT > New Quilt > Horizontal.
14. At the bottom of your screen, click the Layout tab.
15. In the box to the side, change the numbers to 1, 1, 10, 10, 0, 0. This will make your quilt a horizontal 1x1 quilt with a 10" square block and no sashing.
16. Click the Borders tab. You should already have a 1" Mitered border.
17. Under Style, click the dropdown arrow and change it to Points Out.
18. Be sure there is a check next to All and also Clone selected border.
19. Double-click on top of the 1.00 size for Left.
20. Type: 5
21. Click directly on the small rectangle on the slider. If it jumps to 4.75 or 5.25 just click to the left or right of the rectangle accordingly to make it jump to 5.00.
22. At the bottom of the Borders palette, change blocks in border to be 1 horizontal and 1 vertical.
23. Click the Add button once. You should now have another 5" Points Out border.
24. At the bottom of the Borders palette, change blocks in border to be 2 horizontal and 2 vertical for this middle border.
25. Click the Add button once. You should now have another 5" Points Out border.
26. At the bottom of the Borders palette, change blocks in border to be 3 horizontal and 3 vertical for this outer border.
27. Two more borders to go.
28. Click the Add button once.
29. Under Style, click the dropdown arrow and change it to Long Vertical.
30. Double-click on top of the 5.00 size for Left.
31. Type: 2.5
32. Click directly onc the small rectangle on the slider. If it jumps to 2.25 or 2.75 just click to the left or right of the rectangle accordingly to make it jump to 2.50.
33. Click the Add button once.
34. Keep this border as a Long Vertical border.
35. Double-click on top of the 2.50 size for Left.
36. Type: 1
37. Click directly onc the small rectangle on the slider. If it jumps to 0.75 or 1.25 just click to the left or right of the rectangle accordingly to make it jump to 1.00.
38. Your quilt center and borders are setup, so click the Layer 1 tab.

Drawing the Block

39. At the top of your screen, click WORKTABLE > Work on Block.
40. Click BLOCK > New Block > Easy Draw.
41. Click BLOCK > Drawing Board Setup.
42. Change all the numbers on the general tab to 5.
43. Click OK.
44. Click the Line tool.
45. Draw a diagonal line from the top-left of your block to the bottom-right.
46. Start 1" down and 1" right from the top-left corner (on the diagonal line) and draw a horizontal line across to the right edge of the block.
47. Starting at the 4" mark on the ruler, draw a vertical line down from the top of the block and stopping on the diagonal line. Your block should match this picture now:
    
    
48. "Box Out" the top border area by drawing short vertical lines from the top edge of the block and stopping at the horizontal line you drew. (So draw a line from the top of the block at 1" and stop 1" down. Then draw a line from the top of the block at 2" and stop 1" down. Draw one more at 3" and stop 1" down.)
49. "Box Out" the right border area by drawing short horizontal lines from the right edge of the block and stopping at the vertical line you drew. (So draw a horizontal line from the right edge of the block at 2" down and stop at the vertical line you drew. Then draw a horizontal line from the right edge of the block at 3" and stop at the vertical line you drew. Draw one more at 4" and stop at the line again.) Your block should match this picture now:
    
50. Then finish off by drawing a diagonal line in each box to match the picture below. (The one in the top-right corner is in the same direction as the large diagonal line. The others are perpendicular. Each box gets a diagonal line.)
    
51. Click the Save in Sketchbook button to save the block.
52. Go to the Color tab at the bottom of your screen and color the block in 2 colors... accenting the mountain:
    
53. Click Save in Sketchbook to save the coloring.

Setting the Block

54. Click WORKTABLE > Work on Quilt.
55. Click the Set tool .
56. Click on the LeMoyne/Diamond Star block in the palette to select it. Click it in the center square of the quilt.
57. Click on the Delectable Moutains block in the palette to select it.
58. Click a left-facing colorway arrow at the bottom of the palette if you block is see-through right now and you don't see the coloring you saved.
59. Point your cursor to an empty triangle space in the first border.
60. Hold down your keyboard CTRL key and click to set it in every triangle.
61. Repeat (CTRL+click) for the other triangles in the other borders. Your quilt should look something like this now:
    
62. Click the Rotate tool on your toolbar.
63. Hold down the ALT key on your keyboard as you click once on a triangle in the outer right border. (ALT makes all 3 in that border rotate together.) Repeat for the middle and inner triangle borders on the right.
64. Hold down the ALT key as you click twice on a triangle in the bottom border. Repeat for the other two borders at the bottom.
65. ALT+click 3 times on the left borders.
66. (The top ones are okay as they are.) Your quilt should look like this now:
    

Color the Quilt and Blocks

67. Click the Paintbrush tool .
68. Choose a color from the palette and CTRL+click it in the various spaces on the quilt.
69. Keep going coloring the quilt until you're happy with it.
    
70. Your blocks and borders are colored. Good job!

Save the quilt

71. Click the Save in Sketchbook button .
72. Click the View Sketchbook button and click the Quilts tab.
73. Click the Notecard button.
74. In the top Name field, type: "My Delectable Mountains quilt".
75. Click the "X" in the bottom-right to close the Sketchbook.
76. Click the Save button to save your notecard information.
77. Your Delectable Mountains quilt is now complete, and saved on the hard drive.

Print the blocks (optional)

78. To print a rotary cutting chart for the blocks click the Select tool . Click on the block on the quilt.
79. Click FILE - Print - Rotary Cutting. Click the Size from quilt box. Click Print.

to be continued with another Benni Harper mystery quilt