Foxy Four Patch Baby Quilt (Part 1)

Sewing and crafting is such a rare occurrence for me at the moment.

My son was given the opportunity to go on a weekend camp through one of the NDIS providers. So out came the sewing machine, a quick visit to Lincraft on the way home and I was set for a weekend of crafty goodness.

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1 metre of the foxy fabric

2 metres of each of the greys

1 fat quarter of grey gingham

1x spool of grey thread

Here is the plan .... to make a four patch repeating block for a baby quilt.

Fussy cut the foxes out (the longest part of this process) and block each four patch with the darker grey.

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I only had one fat quarter of gingham, so I had to use it sparingly.  

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Punctuation patchwork experiments

Remember this baby quilt top?

Yesterday I managed to get an hour to myself in my sewing room (while the jet setters were passed out) and I started to play around with using up the scraps from my Punctuation baby quilt top to construct some more blocks either for pillows or another quilt top.

Rather than a block of 4 x4 2.5 inch squares, I played around with including a 4.5 inch square white block in the middle. Yet again, I am cutting into my Kona Solid "snow" that I have put aside for my daughers neverending Paintbox Quilt.

I am still undecided as to whether to hand embroider letters or punctuation marks onto the white insides or applique them. The appliqued letters use up a 2.5 x 2.5 inch square, but for me, hand embroidery is sometimes much easier.

Quality Control officer Anastasia

I think they would make either yet another cute baby quilt top or some cute nursery cushions.What do you think?

Working with Charm Squares

I go through different stages of wanting to do patchwork quilt tops and then I will spend sometime just doing batting/quilting. So I generally have a few quilts on the go at any one time. Yesterday was a quilt top day, so I decided to try a technique that I have read about, but never tried.

I started off with nine charm square blocks, each 5 inches x 5 inches. Sewed them together to make a large block.

Once sewn, press and then slice into four even sections. I used my quilting ruler to measure 2 and 1/4 inches in from one of the middle seams.

Once sliced rotate 90 degrees or 180 degrees to create a new pattern. I have found that it is imperative to pin the seams together that you want to line up before you sew them. I know that this sounds strange, but when I sew I hardly use pins unless doing curved seams.

When you are joining the bigger blocks together, pin the matching seams and then if they don't match up 100% give the blocks a blast of steam from your iron and the fabric will either shrink or stretch to match up.

Here is the result of my efforts!

Not sure what I am going to back it in yet .. might get more of the red/orange dots to back the quilt or look for a red/purple to match the front. The colour scheme came from the red and purple on the spiders body.