Busy as a Bee (sorry)

It's a funny thought but I'm supposed to be moving house on Friday.  We still haven't exchanged contracts but the removal men are booked and what feels like 90% of the house (but is probably nearer 10%) is in boxes in the hall way.  I suppose it's a 50/50 chance at this point...

Anyway, before I could face the horror of packing up my workroom, I knew I had to catch up on a few bits and bats.  For the first time since I joined my two sewing bees, I had COMPLETELY NEGLECTED an entire month.

So, with no further ado, here is my "Squirrel at the Wheel" block for Quiltification (I hadn't realised but judging by that tutorial we appear to share a lot of orange stash):

And my chicken block for Just Jude Designs:

And the last two blocks for my village knitting group's quilt bee, Teresa's Pinwheel and Morning Star II.

Oooh, after the summer "holidays" I've had, I can't lie, it's been lovely to get a bit of a stitch on.  I'll have to start putting it all in boxes tomorrow though.  Wish me luck!

Bee block for May

This month for my knitting group's quilting bee we're making a Box Kite block.  Yet again I was not especially impressed with the cutting instructions I found on the site we're using to choose our blocks, so I thought I'd have a bash at a quicker method.

The block is basically 2 sets of 4 HSTs and one square.  The blocks we're making are 12.5" square, so I started by cutting one 4.5" square for the middle.  So far, so good.

Then for the HSTs, I used the following method.  I cut a square of white and a square of print at 5.25" and laid them right sides together.  I drew a diagonal line across them with vanishing marker, and sewed .25" on both sides of that line.  Like this:

Then you cut along that line, and fold out your new HSTs.  They'll be a bit too big so you can trim them down to a perfect 4.5" - line up the seam against the 45° line on your quilting ruler to make sure everything's as straightened up as possible.

Two lots of those makes 4 HSTs.  Another two with a different print and you have 8 HSTs as required, so now all you need do is arrange them into rows and sew together to look like this:

Boom!  Looks nice, doesn't it?  We're 5 blocks in so far and some of them have been right buggers; it was about time we got an easy one!