Winged Square - Building Blocks Tuesday

I have no new blocks to share today, so I pulled this one out of the archives.  I made this for the Simply Solid Bee back in 2013 and at the time my bee mate was calling it a Winged Square.  I've recently seen a few quilts that have blown up this block to the entire size of the quilt, and they look fabulous.

Have any of you done one of those supersized one-block quilts?  Which block did you use?

What blocks have you working on this week?  I would love to see.  Link up your fabulous blocks.  You put a lot of hard work into them - show them off!  This free linky will stay open until the first Monday of next month, but I will repost it every Tuesday until a new month starts.

Rules:

1) Please link up only to the page in your blog showing your wonderful blocks, not just the blog homepage.  Flickr and Instagram pictures are also OK.
2) Make sure to put your blog name as the description so people know where they are going or the name of your block!
3) Please grab my button and post it in your blog post or sidebar.
4) Visit other linky participants!

Thanks for reading,

Jen

An InLinkz Link-up

Penelope Star for Simply Solids December

Welcome fellow Simply Solids bee mates!  I first encountered this block when another bee mate from the Star of Africa bee wished it for her month.  Her blocks turned out so lovely that I was rather jealous at the time, so I am happy to have a chance to get my own Penelope Stars.  You can find the original tutorial here at Stitches and Scissors, but I have also put together a little tutorial of my own since I changed a few minor dimensions to help with success.

What you will need:

• Eight 7 inch squares of Medium Gray (I will be sending you these in the mail!)
• Four 7 inch squares of Color One (stash bust from your favorite colors)
• One 6.5 inch square of Color One (stash bust from your favorite colors)
• Four 7 inch squares of Color Two (stash bust from your favorite colors)
• One 6.5 inch square of Color Two (stash bust from your favorite colors)

Assembly:

Set your 6.5 inch squares of Color One and Two aside.  You won't be doing anything with them but I need them for the final layout.

Take the four 7 inch squares of Color One and the four 7 inch squares of Color Two and cut them on the diagonal into two triangles.

We are essentially going to make wonky star points by taking a 7 inch gray square and stitching a triangle of Color One to the right side of the square.

I like to make sure my fabric will cover the square when flipped over after pressing before I sew it.

Once you have your triangle sewn in place.  Double check to be sure when you press it, that it will cover the gray square (Ask me how I know this is important).  Then trim the extra gray fabric from the seam.  You can either toss these trimmings into your own scrap pile or send them back to me, your choice.



Press the seam toward the gray regardless of whether you have chosen a dark color for your solid.  Repeat for the other 3 gray squares for Color One and 4 gray squares to be paired with Color 2, varying the angles of the triangle to make them all individual.  Your pieces should look, roughly, like this.



Now sew another colored triangle to the left side of the gray square.



Again, I like to just be sure that when flipped it will cover the gray square.



Once sewn on, trim the excess fabric from the seam allowance and press toward the gray.  Again, either keep these trimmings or send them to me (I like to make improv blocks from these).  Repeat for the other gray squares and colors.



It should look, roughly, like this, once pressed.



Now trim your pieces to 6.5 inches square.  I purposely started everyone with 7 inch gray squares so that you would have some to trim away.  It may seem a little wasteful, but the first time I made these blocks I had a few corners come up short using the original instructions, and had to start over.  That was a pain!



For each Color you should have one center square and four squares of star "points".  That is it.  Put them in a bag as is, and mail them to me.  I will assemble the rest.



In case you are curious, the stars will fit together something like this in the finished quilt.




Hopefully, I will have lots of different colors!  And I'm really looking forward to quilting the daylights out of those nice big stars.

Thank you in advance for everyone in my hive!  I hope I am not asking too much for everyone to do two colors.  It takes a lot of stars to make the quilt, and with your help, I'll have about 1/3 done!

Thanks again,

Jen

In a Slump - Building Blocks Tuesday

I finally sat down yesterday at my sewing machine after not having touched it for over 2 weeks.  I made my Simply Solids block for November.

I admit, I am in a bit of a slump.  Not the best time of year to have a slump, but I am going with it and taking a bit of a break.  We all need breaks from time to time, right?

What have you been working on this week?  I would love to see.  Link up your fabulous blocks.  You put a lot of hard work into them - show them off!  This free linky will stay open for a whole week.

Rules:

1) Please link up only to the page in your blog showing your wonderful blocks, not just the blog homepage.  Flickr pictures are also OK.
2) Make sure to put your blog name as the description so people know where they are going or the name of your block!
3) Please grab my button and post it in your blog post or sidebar.
4) Visit other linky participants!

Thanks for reading!

Jen

HST glory - Building Blocks Tuesday

I made up my October Simply Solids Bee block yesterday.  There it is in all its HST glory.  I think this is one of those blocks that doesn't look like much on its own, but when put together with friends is a real show stopper.  I guess I will just have to wait for the finished photos to see.

In other sewing, I am finishing up the last few stitches on my Handstitched Medallion quilt, which I plan to showcase on Friday when I host TGIFF!  I hope you will come back then and check out all the great finishes from the participants.

Until then....

What have you been working on this week?  I would love to see.  Link up your fabulous blocks.  You put a lot of hard work into them - show them off!  This free linky will stay open for a whole week.

Rules:

1) Please link up only to the page in your blog showing your wonderful blocks, not just the blog homepage.  Flickr pictures are also OK.
2) Make sure to put your blog name as the description so people know where they are going or the name of your block!
3) Please grab my button and post it in your blog post or sidebar.
4) Visit other linky participants!

Thanks for reading!

Jen

Seeing Spots - Building Blocks Tuesday

This week I knocked off my blocks for the Simply Solids Bee, and it had me seeing spots.

Meli asked us to make these circles in warm/cool colors.  The tutorial is found HERE at Bijou Lovely.   They were super easy to make and I think would make a darling quilt if you fussy cut the circles from an interesting print.

What have you been working on this week?  I would love to see.  Link up your fabulous blocks.  You put a lot of hard work into them - show them off!  This free linky will stay open for a whole week.

Rules:

1) Please link up only to the page in your blog showing your wonderful blocks, not just the blog homepage.  Flickr pictures are also OK.
2) Make sure to put your blog name as the description so people know where they are going or the name of your block!
3) Please grab my button and post it in your blog post or sidebar.
4) Visit other linky participants!

I hope you will join me on Thursday as we kick off the One Block Wonder QAL with a mini-interview with Maxine Rosenthal, co-author of the One Block Wonder books.

Thanks for reading!

Jen

Rainbows and whales - Building Blocks Tuesday

I finished another Star of Africa Bee Block!  Hooray, only 3 more to go.

This one is for Cindy who requested a colorful block with a white background.  What could be more colorful than a rainbow?  I knew I wanted to make a Hawaiian rainbow (especially after our vacation there), but the white background started to get a little lost with all I wanted to include in the block.  So, I made the block a bit smaller and framed it in white.  I hope that gives her enough white to make it play nicely with the other blocks in her quilt.

How do you like my little whale tail?  We weren't there during whale season this time, but it is amazing to see.  If you ever get the chance to visit Maui between November and early April, it is a show every time you look out across the water.

I also finished up my Simply Solids bee blocks for August.

The block is called "Goose Creek" and you can find the instruction here at Quilter's Cache.

What have you been working on this week?  I want to know!  Link up your fabulous blocks.  You put a lot of hard work into them - show them off!  This free linky will stay open for a whole week.

Rules:

1) Please link up only to the page in your blog showing your wonderful blocks, not just the blog homepage.  Flickr pictures are also OK.
2) Make sure to put your blog name as the description so people know where they are going or the name of your block!
3) Please grab my button and post it in your blog post or sidebar.
4) Visit other linky participants!

For those of you that had trouble using my button recently, I apologize.  I guess blogger changed a few things and my code didn't translate.  I hope I have it fixed now.

Thanks for reading!

Jen

Piece and quiet - Building Blocks Tuesday

Ah, back to our regularly scheduled programming.  I was so happy yesterday, to finally get a chance to sit down at my machine in peace and quiet.  Ashley and Lizzy are at gymnastics day camp, and Olivia is back at preschool, allowing me to get caught up on laundry, mail, AND a couple bee blocks.  So I pieced in the quiet - Ha!

Here is the one I made for Rachel for July's Simply Solid's bee.

It has a Art Deco feeling to me, but maybe that has more to do with the colors??

It is called The Marine's Star and you can find the instructions at Quilters Cache and Rachel was kind enough to do a mini tutorial for us too on her blog Sew Happily Ever After.

In other news, my vacation was lovely, but it is over.  It's funny, you can only lay around by the pool for so long before your mind begins to actually THINK.  We were there for a while, so I had lots of thinking time.  What was on my mind most often was this blog (what I am doing with it and what I want to do with it in the future), and of course my quilting (what the heck is my style, do I want to focus or be a free spirit, etc.).  Don't worry, I don't think there will be any dramatic changes overnight (though a face-lift of my blog might occur one night), these things take time.

But enough of that blah, blah, blah.  What have you been working on this week?  I want to know!

Link up your fabulous blocks.  You put a lot of hard work into them - show them off!  This free linky will stay open for a whole week.

Rules:

1) Please link up only to the page in your blog showing your wonderful blocks, not just the blog homepage.  Flickr pictures are also OK.
2) Make sure to put your blog name as the description so people know where they are going or the name of your block!
3) Please grab my button and post it in your blog post or sidebar.
4) Visit other linky participants!

Thanks for reading!

Jen

Juggling oranges - Building Blocks Tuesday

Sometime yesterday, I realized that I didn't have any new blocks to show today.   I barely had any time to sew since last Wednesday and when I got a chance here and there, I worked on finishing up my Impromptu blocks.  I am almost done with those.  Luckily, the June Simply Solids block was easy, peasy.

The Queen Bee for the month asked that we make 2 of these big blocks using the instructions at the Moda Bake Shop by Jeni Baker from In Color Order.  She asked for solids in grey, aqua, turquoise (which is really similar to aqua, right?) and orange.  Now, I know I have mentioned on this blog that orange is not my favorite color, but I have bought plenty of orange fabrics because other people do like it and it is frequently requested in the bees I participate in.  Well, imagine my surprise when I went to my stash to complete these blocks and found that I only had 2 solid oranges to choose from.  2!  I have well over a dozen orange prints, but this is a solids bee.  I had plenty of aquas and at least 50 shades of grey, but only 2 oranges.  So of course, she got them both!

I'm going to go try to press that horrendous crease out of that grey block - where do these things come from between downstairs in the sewing room to where I photograph my blocks upstairs near the window??

So what have you been working on this week?  I want to know!

Link up your fabulous blocks.  You put a lot of hard work into them - show them off!  This free linky will stay open for a whole week.  And spread the word!

Rules:

1) Please link up only to the page in your blog showing your wonderful blocks, not just the blog homepage.  Flickr pictures are also OK.
2) Make sure to put your blog name as the description so people know where they are going or the name of your block!
3) Please grab my button and post it in your blog post or sidebar.
4) Visit other linky participants!

Thanks for reading!

Jen

This isn't a ski blog - Building Blocks Tuesday

Check out the improv block I did today for Licet in the Simply Solids Bee.  She chose the prettiest colors didn't she?  These improv blocks are fun, but I really want to see what they all look like put together.

We are back from our ski trip to Mammoth, CA.  I didn't break anything this year - hooray!  AND, I got all the best prices at my yard sales (skiers will know what I mean).

They call it Mammoth Mountain because it is HUGE.  This is just one part of the mountain, there are at least four.  I was too busy enjoying myself to take many pictures.  We had gorgeous bluebird spring weather 4 of the 5 days we skied.  Not too shabby!

The girls all had a great time too.  Here's a pic of them riding in the gondola.

Olivia didn't ski, but she enjoyed riding the gondola up the mountain each morning and waving goodbye to her sisters at ski school.  Here are my little daredevils.

Lizzy did extremely well for her 2nd year on skis, and Ashley, well, she can almost ski better than me at this point, and she is only 6!  We are very proud of them.

But hey, this isn't a ski blog, is it?  So what have you been working on this week?

Link up your fabulous blocks.  You put a lot of hard work into them - show them off!  This free linky will stay open for a whole week.  And spread the word!

Rules:

1) Please link up only to the page in your blog showing your wonderful blocks, not just the blog homepage.  Flickr pictures are also OK.
2) Make sure to put your blog name as the description so people know where they are going or the name of your block!
3) Please grab my button and post it in your blog post or sidebar.
4) Visit other linky participants!


Thanks for reading,

Jen

Simply Solids - Building Blocks Tuesday

Yippee!  Another Bee started in February - the Simply Solids Bee.  Yes, I know I got a little crazy signing up for stuff at the beginning of the year.  But, I love solids, and so far this bee has been a breeze.  I've even have 2 blocks to show you today!

For February, Sew Chick requested these fun Star Gazing Blocks from the book, Modern Blocks compiled by Susanne Woods.  This book is chock full of good blocks for bees, and I had a lot of fun making this one.

Sew Chick sent me all the fabric I needed to make this beauty and it came together pretty quickly.

Surprisingly, the March Block was posted and Nicole got her fabrics out early, so I was able to finish her blocks up too.  What? Ahead of the game?  Yep!

This one is called Puzzle Box by Brigette at Zen Chic and the instructions are available at the Moda Bake Shop here.  Nicole asked us to make 4 blocks, but sent us all the fabric we needed, and the block was pretty darn simple.

I've also been working on catching up on my Star of Africa Blocks, but I would rather wait and show you all of them at once.  Maybe next week?

So what have you been working on this week?

Link up your fabulous blocks.  You put a lot of hard work into them - show them off!  This free linky will stay open for a whole week.  And spread the word!

Rules:

1) Please link up only to the page in your blog showing your wonderful blocks, not just the blog homepage.  Flickr pictures are also OK.
2) Make sure to put your blog name as the description so people know where they are going or the name of your block!
3) Please grab my button and post it in your blog post or sidebar.
4) Visit other linky participants!


Thanks for reading,

Jen