A DAY FOR QUILTING

As it was an extremely dull and misty day yesterday, I took myself off into the quilting room. 

Last year, my friend Val from Kerrie's quilting group gave me some material and some blocks she had left over from a quilt she had made called 'Rhapsody'.  

Here's how the block is made.

1.  Take six different coloured pieces of material 9" square.

2.  Lay each piece on top of each other with the right sides up.

3.  Draw some lines on the top piece of where you want to cut.

3.  Take your scissors and cut through the six pieces of material, making around eight cuts.

4.  You now have six layers of material cut into nine pieces - eight cuts, with one piece left over at the end.

5.  Take the outer pieces and create six outer sections for the 'new' blocks - different colours.

6.  Take the inner section cut outs, and place them inside the outer sections - but using a different colour to the outer section.

7.  Finally, you are left with the centre pieces.  Again place them in the centre of your 'new' blocks, and again in a different colour.

8.  You are now ready to sew all the pieces back together again and create your new block.

When you have finished these six blocks, you gather another six pieces of different coloured materials and start all over again.  It's great fun.

Here's a photograph of the quilt from the website of the lady who created it.

The instructions say that when you draw the initial lines for cutting, you use a slight in your lines curve.  However, I had a lot of trouble with sewing these curves and finally gave up and drew straight lines!  Unlike mine, the curved line blocks Val had already made were beautifully sewn and flat. So my quilt is going to be a mix of curved lines and straight lines:)

As you can see, the blocks have all been laid 'on point' and the spaces around the outer edges filled in with triangles.  I've never done this before but am going to give it a bash.

If you turn your head slightly to the left as you look at this quilt you can see number one block on the top left corner.  Move down to the next line and you will see three blocks, next line 5 blocks, next line 7 blocks and so on.  I think that is the way I have to sew the blocks together - first in these lines with the triangles at each end and then when I've finished the last line, I begin again at the top and sew each line together.  Once I see what the top looks like when the blocks are sewn together, I will decide what colour to use for the border.

Watch this space!

Love Nanxxx  PS  We were promised 10-20mls of rain and only received 3mls.  We are very sad :(  Today we have been promised 20-40mls.  We shall see.