The second Saturday of every month my quilt group has "Sewing Saturday" where we all get together at our normal meeting place and sew all day. It's like having a little retreat every month. I use that time to work on my community service quilts, primary QOV quilts and quilts for our veteran's quilt project. I try to plan 2 quilts at a time and make basically the same quilt for both.
I finished the last 2 quilts in August and have been making string blocks ever since for the next 2 quilts. I finished the last of the string blocks this Saturday, thankfully. I really don't enjoy making string blocks and I got really tired of these.
This weekend I decided to put them all on the design wall and get the blocks arranged and read to sew together in February.
This is the veterans quilt. The matter is from Mollie except that I made my blocks 8.5". The veterans quilts are 48 x 60 and I think this is going to look very nice once it's all together.
The blocks for each row are neatly stacked, labeled and ready to sew next month.
I was so please with myself that I put up the blocks for the QOV. It need to be 8 blocks wide in 10 rows. Imagine my shock and horror when I realized that I was 13 blocks short!
To think that I was an accounting major and I can't even count quilt blocks correctly. It's a wonder that I had a career at all.
I started to pull some fabrics for the large triangles and get them ready to sew up in February but the more I though about it the more I could not bear the thought of making one more string block. Instead I headed to EQ to see if I could some up with another solution using only the blocks I had.
This is what I came up with and, I admit, I think I like it better than the veterans quilt. I didn't like the large gold triangles once I got it on the wall so I switched those out for dark ones. This layout left me with 4 spare blocks and I traded a few more with the veterans quilt so I could get all dark triangles in this one. Then I found the leftovers from a hand dyed backing in my stash to use for the sashing and I was good to go.
You can get an idea of what it will look like here and I like it a lot. I think it makes a really interesting quilt. Sometimes the mistakes lead us to better designs.
I understand being sick of making string blocks. Nice design solution. Both quilts looks great but the QOV is my fav!
Posted by: Becky in VA | January 16, 2013 at 01:46 PM
I'm loving both of these quilts! Perfect for men with the deep dark colors! Great idea with the sashing, too! Love it!
Posted by: Regan Martin | January 16, 2013 at 01:57 PM
Mistakes can have great outcomes, as yours did.
Posted by: laceflower | January 17, 2013 at 11:39 AM
I like them both too. I'm making some courthouse steps blocks with leftover strips and strings and found that the addition of sashing improves them too. Sometimes I don't know what I'll end up!
Posted by: Mollie | January 17, 2013 at 05:44 PM