Buttons and Bows

Hello Everyone,

 

It's been a busy week here at Wilder's Last Resort.  I loved being inside at my machine while the snow fell like crazy.  I worked on this project for Henry Glass & Co.  I'm going to call it Buttons and Bows.  There aren't any buttons on it yet, just pretend for now...ok?

 

With the borders, the quilt measure 46" x 46".  There are (36) 6" x 6" blocks in the quilt.

There is where the "bows" comes into the name of the quilt.  There are little flashes of red in each of the corners.  I finished it off with a flange, border, and a little "scrolly" accent in a corner.

I began the project by combining two lines of Henry Glass fabrics, Country Journey by Jan Mott, and Best of Days by Janet Rae Nesbitt. 

I put a little tutorial together so you can see how I made the blocks.  I began by cutting a lot of 1" strips and put them on my Strip'n Sew that Mr. Joe made for me.  A pasta dryer works well too.

Then select 6 different fabrics.

Stitch them together.

Always press toward the last strip sewn on.

Cut the strip set into (12) 3-1/2" x 3-1/2" squares.

You will have a ton of these!  Each strip set makes three identical blocks.

Lay them out like this.

Place a 1-1/2" x 1-1/2" square on the two center corners.  Note that I mark each square corner to corner.  Stitch directly on the marked line.

Trim off the extra.

Now you will have this.  Press toward the red square.

Now stitch the sections together.

Now put 1-1/2" x 1-1/2" on each of the other corners. 

Stitch and trim.

Press the corners in the opposite directions.  When you do this, the blocks will "lock" when you put all of the blocks together in the quilt.

Voila!  (36) 6-1/2" x 6-1/2" unfinished blocks.

It has been very cold here.....too cold to venture out to the detached garage and machine quilt.  Yesterday I checked on the temperature in the garage.....31 degrees is not an optimal machine quilting temperature.  I could use my space heater, but it's like heating a barn.  I may be able to get the temperature up a few degrees, but by then, I would still turn into a popsicle.

Don't forget to check out the comment section on my blog.  I've been keeping up with the comments, and I've responded to each and every one.  It's been fun, and it's creating an ongoing dialog about each post.  I like being able to touch base with everyone, even those with a no-reply status.

Have a great 3-day weekend!  It's always a 3-day weekend here in the mountains.  If I didn't have my to-do calendar next to my computer, I would never know what day it is!

Soon,
Madam Ambassador
for Henry Glass Fabrics