Block-a-Palooza # 13

 

Good Morning Block-a-Palooza Folks! How are you doing this morning? I hope you are all doing well. It sure is nice to have you here! OK, so what do you say we get started on block # 13? I used some of the very pretty pale fabrics from Moda's Sunkissed line, by Sweetwater. The background is a very light gray named feather. If you look at this block you will see that it is basically a fancy 9 patch. There are 9 areas to it, and we will make them in sections. Each of the 9 sections of the block will measure 4.5 inches square and when they are all stitched together the block will be 12.5 inches. Does that make sense? I hope so.

For this block you will need the following bits of fabric:

Feather Gray Background:

4 - 4.5" squares
8 - 2.5" squares

Misty Grey Summer Garden (5448 15) Wordy fabric

4 - 4.5" x 2.5" rectangles

Misty Grey Secret Garden (5441 15)

4 - 2.5" squares
4 - 4.5 x 2.5 rectangles

1.5 x 22" strip

Pink Sorbet Skinny lines (5443 24)

5 - 1.75" squares

Ivory and grey Petals (5445 15)

4 - 1.75 " squares

When stitching blocks together keep the seam allowance at 1/4 inch for best results.

I started my block by beginning with the center 9 patch. Stitch these 1.75" squares together to make a 9 patch.

 

You will see that this center, and most important block is not quite 4.5 inches. Cut a 1.5 x 22 inch strip to boarder this block with. Stitch it on like above. I just cut one long strip, and chain pieced it to the block. I find there is alot less waste this way. But I know some of you are new quilters (Welcome!!!!) and may be confused by this.

So here the center block is with the boarder stitched on. We need to trim the entire piece down to 4.5 inches. That is easy to do, just line it up on your cutting mat and trim it down.

 OK, that is much better. Moving on to the next section....

We will now make our 4 flying geese blocks. There are a bunch of ways to make flying geese. This is my favorite method when I am just making a few. I stitch right along the pencil line. And trim off the excess leaving behind a 1/4 inch seam allowance.

Do the same thing for the other side of the goose. And press your block open.

These next 4 blocks are the corner blocks. Take your 4.5 inch feather Gray (or whatever you are using for your background) blocks and put the 2.5 inch misty gray squares in each corner. Draw a diagonal pencil line to stitch along. 

Trim off the excess and press your blocks open.

Let's do a layout to see how everything looks so far.

Next step is to sew the flying geese to the 2.5 x 4.5 inch rectangles. I lay all my pieces out right by the sewing machine to keep it simple.

We are in the home stretch now. Just sew the block together and press! Add it to your stack of other Block Palooza pieces. And get ready for block #14 by Ryan Walsh. His blog is I'm Just A Guy Who Quilts. 

Don't forget to add pictures of your blocks to the Flickr Group.

Let me know in the comment section or the Flickr group if you have any questions.

Have a great Day!

Tia

A PDF of this block can be found HERE or on the Flickr site or on the next post of this blog.