Saturday, January 18, 2014

Progress

If there is no struggle there is no progress. Those who profess to favor freedom and yet deprecate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground, they want rain without thunder and lightning. They want the ocean without the awful roar of its many waters. This struggle may be a moral one, or it may be a physical one, and it may be both moral and physical, but it must be a struggle. Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will. 
Frederick Douglass


This week has zoomed by!  I have been able to spend some time in the studio and made progress on several projects.  I have the top together for the grandson's quilt but it still is in need of borders.  "What shall I add?" is now the question.

I thought you might like to learn a little about the book I used for this quilt.  It is from, with a slight change, Angles with Ease by Heather Mulder Peterson.   You can read more about the book and see better pictures of the projects at her blog HERE and HERE.




In order to make the projects in this book you must also buy the Triangler Ruler that she designed.  Many of the projects in the book are based on cutting the triangles out of strip pieced units by aligning the lines on the ruler to get shapes like this one below.  The only other ways to make designs like these is to either use templates or paper piecing.






The change I made in the pattern was to make 8 blocks instead of the 7 pictured in the project below so my arrangement of blocks is different.




So here is what I have so far.  Like I said it's time for a border.  I could leave it off.  The book shows a small inner border followed by one made of squares.  





I could also just add one made of the the animal print below that I'm going to use for the backing.  What do you think?  I plan on using the stripe for binding.





Here is the setting for a larger quilt in the book made with the same block.  You can see better pictures from the book at Heather's blog.  Looks a whole lot different with the background changed.





This method does leave you with some scraps from cutting out the triangles.  Because I wanted to use 8 different pairs of fabrics I wound up with enough for 16 blocks.  I am about half way through making the other 8 blocks but I am putting 4 different fabrics in each block instead of 2.  I'll share pictures of them soon.

Scraps!
I don't know if I am up to making something else from the scraps or not.  Even though I like the fabrics 2 quilts out of them may be all I can handle.  There is a project in the book using the scraps from on of the projects.  It's the Calypso quilt at the bottom of the page above.  I may cut out the triangles and set them aside to deal with later.



I have enjoyed making these blocks and would recommend the book and the ruler. If kaleidoscope type quilt blocks intrigue you it is a good method to use.  The blocks have all bias edges so you do have to be careful and not stretch them at all.  I did not have any problems with them but I've made a number of quilts with bias edged blocks before.  I did not use spray starch but most of my fabrics were unwashed and nice and crisp.

I have a tip on how to avoid having mountains or valleys in the middle of blocks like this that I will be sharing soon.  

What would you do about the border?  Any ideas for the scraps?

Linking with:  Confessions of a Fabric Addict and Richard and Tanya Quilt and
                         Sew Many Ways and Let's Book It at Vroomans Quilts

9 comments:

  1. Think this will look great with no border and a syrupy binding Patricia, you wouldn't want anything to detract from that wonderful piecing!

    I am sure you will come up with something good for those scraps.

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  2. Sorry should pay attention to the predictive text! Should read stripy binding not syrupy :)

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  3. Very cute. It is fun to do a quilt with a speciality ruler.

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  4. very appealing tempted to have a go but too much in the pipeline at the moment!

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  5. This looks like a great project! I really love your fabric choices - super fun!!

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  6. I love her patterns and hadn't seen this book before... Looks like fun! I love the border in the book and would mix in some of the backing fabric into the squares. I'm not quite used to the all solids look I guess so take my advice with that in mind! I love pieced borders and think they add such a nice element.

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  7. So bright and pretty! I would do a solid border ...I think the animal print will distract from your lovely blocks. Having said that I could be wrong, too! :)

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  8. I just saw this post. I love the blocks. You always come up with the neatest designs. You probably have the quilt finished by now. I love the backing fabric. I love solids, solids, and more solids or fabrics that read as solids. The little bit of texture to some of the fabrics is great, too. I hadn't seen this ruler, but that's nothing new. There seems to be twenty new rulers or more every day. Thanks for the endorsement. Some of them are a royal pain and others are terrific. I have never found bias sewing to be problematic. I tend to take it a little slower and try to make sure I don't pull. I let the machine do the work. I think some of that comes from being a garment maker and understanding bias. Thanks for a wonder post.

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  9. Have you thought of using a flange instead of the skinny border? This is very interesting and colorful. Thank you for sharing a wonderful book, pattern, and tool.

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