Roman Blinds 2

Thank you for your comments yesterday, I still have a few to reply to by email but as ever I do appreciate you taking the time to comment.  As I've been busy trying out arrangements today i thought I'd get on and show you what I've been doing.

Yestrday evening I trimmed all the blocks to 8" squares.  Sadly I had my opinion that I am not a traditional quilter reinforced as one set was slightly wonky so if anyone has a serious perfection gene please look away ;-)

As you can see I cut off the timiest slivers from each side to square the blocks up.  Ideally the 45 degree angle should lay along the diagonal stitch line but I was adrift on a few.

Having trimmed all the squares up I then had a play with potential layouts.

First of all a basic layout (excuse the untidy and scruffy bedroom)

This keeps the 7 designs in their straight lines.  Did you spot the deliberate mistake How did I miss that!

Layout 2, still in design lines but with what I call windmills.

Layout 3, diamonds.

Layout 4, Flying Geese.

Layout 5, a central star with blocks still in a uniform design arrangement.

Layout 6, central star with the blocks mixed up a bit.

And finally, layout 7 with the blocks mixed up and a small adjustment made to the arrangement compared to layout 6.

I don't think there's a lot to choose between 6 and 7.  I don't like layout 1 or 4 but I do like 5 and 7.  Because there are 6 rows and 7 designs of block you could play forever to balance the blocks so that you don't get obvious duplicates throughout.

I have pinned together in rows the blocks from layout 7 but I am not going to sew them yet as I have to decide whether to add sashing anywhere and I also need to select fabrics for borders to make the quilt big enough for a bed.  I may yet change my mind about the layout too!

Roman Blinds

A couple of weeks ago at my monthly quilting group Trudi, who blogs as 'Quilting Prolifically' gave a workshop on piecing Roman Stripes (not Roman Blinds as I keep calling them!).  Probably for the first time ever I have actually come home and finished off the project and made something with the blocks. 

This cushion, which is a bit overstuffed until I can get the proper pad for it, is made with my Roman Stripes made from 2 commercial fabrics and my hand dyed greeny fabric and my hand dyed background fabric.  As I ended up with 9 blocks I played about with them until I had an arrangement I liked.

The evening must have hit my inspired button as I couldn't wait to have a play with a collection of batik strips that I had bought last year and which were reclining in my drawer begging to be used.  The first step was to sort the 2 and a half inch strips into group of light medium and dark and then to select groups of three to join together along their length.



Once you have joined each set of three strips you need to cut a 'backing' strip from your background fabric, the width and length of the joined strips.  These two pieces are then sewn together with right sides facing. (Sorry I forgot to photograph that step).  This is my background fabric:

Once the fabric sandwich is made the fun starts!

Take your quilting ruler and line the 45 degree line up along the bottom edge or line of stitching of your block. (The arrow above shows that I lined mine up with my stitch line).  Once you're sure it's straight cut along the edge and discard the end piece.

Next slide the ruler up so that the 45 degree line lays along the top edge or top line of stitch and cut again.

You will end up with a triangle which opens out to reveal the backinground fabric and magically makes a square!

How good is that?!  Continue along the strip and every subsequent strip until all your squares are cut and you are left with some excitingly shaped scraps!  More photos to come!

I have currently got 42 blocks to play with and because of the width of strip I used my blocks will finish at about 7.5 inches so I have enough for a top which I will probably add borders to to make a bed quilt.  At the moment I am trying to decide whether I could possibly make these up in a Quilt As You Go fashion.  Any advice anyone?