Squares and Half Square Triangles - A Quilt Block Tutorial

Do you remember this jacket that I bought for my eldest last autumn?! I wanted to copy that design into a quilt ever since. May is my month in our bee and here is the oppertunity to finally use the design.

I made up this block using only Half Square Triangles (HST) and squares. The plain squares are a 3” size. For the HST I cut 3,5” squares.

I am sure my fellow Sew-Euro-bee-ans know perfectly well how to sew HSTs but I thought I could as well shoot some step-by-step photos.

For those HSTs take two 3,5” squares, place them right sides together and draw a diagonal line from one corner to the opposite one.

Sew next to the marked line, using a 1/4 inch seam allowance. Turn and sew along the other side.

Your square should now look like this:

Cut along the marked line:

Press the seams to one side (you could also press the seams open if you like it better that way. It certainly decreases the amount of bulk in the following steps – but I’m a lazy girl so I pressed the seams to one side (o:). Afterwards square up to 3” size, lining up your 45° mark of your ruler with the centre seam.

Repeat.

Then lay out the HST blocks and the plain squares in a nice mix of values. Afterwards assemble the rows using a 1/4 inch seam allowance

When assembling the rows I never cut the thread so the rows are kept in place by the connecting threads.

Afterwards press the seams to one side – alternating the direction every other row.

Sew the rows together and you are done:

In case you might be wondering about my choice of colours: I always wanted to make a solids-only quilt and I always wanted a quilt that matches our orange couch and the light yellow walls (BTW, I’d never buy an orange couch again…). But I never found something pleasing that matches the exact colours of our room – so being princess bee in May is a wonderful occasion to ask for blocks I can unite in a lovely memory quilt that will be used every day.

Dear Sew-Euro-bee-ans, thank you very much for sewing these blocks for me. They finish at 13” so they are 0,5” bigger than what we stated in our guidelines. But making my master block I realized that it was so much easier to cut 3” squares than 2 7/8”" inch squares… I hope that’s o.k. for you, Ladies!

Have fun and happy sewing!
Christine

A gift-y kind of week

This was a great week full of surprises (o:

On Monday I received a small parcel with stickers and postcards that I won at Zeug & Gold. My friend Eva is a graphic designer who creates beautiful wall-stickers, stickers, t-shirts, pillow cussions, etc. On her Facebook Page she offered a giveaway with some fun stickers:

I can’t decide which ones I like best. Those moustaches? Or the chalkboard stickers? And wouldn’t the postcard design with that tiny orange fox make a super cute boy-ish fabric?! Maybe I should point her to spoonflower one day?!

On Wednesday, I received an email from Jess who blogges at The Elven Garden, based in Tasmania, Australia. Rafflecopter had chosen my name! I follow her blog for quite some months now and when I she offered a giveaway from her sponsor “sew fresh fabrics” of 8 FQ of Architextures, I couldn’t resist to put my name in the hat. Now I wait impatiently for the mailman to bring me some yummy fabric! Thanks again, Jess!

On Thursday, I received a small parcel at work. I had answered a marketing-survey and they had randomly send out some thank-you-gifts to some participants. Now I have a great wireless mouse for my notebook at home (o: Shaped like an exterior rear mirror of a MINI Cooper.

 

And to top it all off, Brigitte sent me some yard cuts of her now-in-stores fabric line COMMA. Thank you so much, Brigitte!!!

Best week in a long while! My colleagues suggested that I should buy a lottery ticket immeadiately. Seems like a lucky streak (o:

Now I guess it’s time to pay it forward. In 4 weeks time I’ll celebrate my first year’s blogging anniversary. Time to start thinking about a little giveaway over here (o:

And to finish off this gift-y week, I made a small gift for my former flatmate during university. She gave birth to her third child recently. A gorgeous little girl that they named Lotta. I made her a swaddling blanket – yay for another opportunity to use some pink (there are so many boys over here!).

I used Thomas Knaur’s “Pear Tree, Birds and Eggs” and backed it with a brown gingham. It is rather large: 90cm square.

And I finally used the alphabet stiches on my new sewing machine.

Hope she will like it! I finished it yesterday night and will have to wrap it and post it tonight/ tomorrow morning.

See you for more finishes next week (o:

Happy weekend everyone!
Christine

Another first…

I finally gave Flying Geese a try! And… well… I am hooked! It was so much fun to play with! My first try at Flying Geese is not done yet (I ran out of fabric for the binding and am still waiting for more). Yet I immediately started a second project.

I’m working as an controller/ accountant IRL and always have a hard time keeping my papers in order and my desk clean-ish. So I got myself a new organizer. One with a 31-days-index. A dull grey one. So I took it home to make a nice cover. A great excuse to use my Charm Pack of bright solids and some dark blue yardage.

I admit that I pretty much enjoyed making those flying geese – even if they are far from perfect. Maybe I should have followed a tutorial instead of making things up on my own?! If someone is able to direct me to a flying geese tutorial please speak up and leave me a comment, I’d appreciate it very much!!!

As I still consider myself a beginner (though slightly advanced and very confident), there are constantly new things that I try – and I was recently directed to Celtic Thistle Stitches’ Linky-Party. On 25th of each month everyone who tried a new technique or craft is invited to share their projects. So if you have tried something new this month, I guess I’ll see you there?!

Happy Sewing!
Christine

Sewing Room Makeover (2)

It’s (almost) done.

For more than two weeks I have not been sewing one single stitch. I dedicated every single minute of my free time to get my sewing room emptied, cleaned, new furniture assembled, and my sewing stuff reorganized. I have to admit that organizing my sewing stuff took almost one week’s time. I hadn’t anticipated that!
And now without further ado I proudly present my new sewing room:

The sewing table:

Many thanks to the friendly employee at our local building supplies store who cut out the holes for my machines!!!

We attached a wooden board underneath and voilà – we were done (o:

My new fabric and notions shelves:

And my new cutting table made from two IKEA Expedit screwed together:

 

Those clear boxes with my unfinished objects happen to fit-in perfectly. The shelves are deep enough to store my (few) bolts, the 24” cutting ruler and the larger dies for my GO! Baby Cutter.

On the opposite side I put in those IKEA fabric boxes…

…that I use to sort my scraps according to colours. BTW: Did you ever see those fabric boxes in red?!

I finally sorted my patterns into folders and organized my sewing books and magazines.

And here’s a lovely box that my mother gave me two years ago as a birthday gift:

 

Now, there’s not much left to do: We need to rearrange the lights and I want my dad to make a simple design wall – my birthday is in three months, so that would be a perfect gift (o:

Thanks so much for your help so far, Papa!!!
Paradise is not far off after all, it’s located in our basement!

Happy Sewing!
Christine