Turnabout Block Using Charm Packs and Layer Cakes

Although I think the Turnabout block looks good in vintage fabrics others might like to try some of the fun new fabrics available to all of us.  A fast way to get a variety of fabrics that coordinate is to buy charm packs or layer cakes.  If you want your blocks to contain just two fabrics like I’m making mine, you will need four charm packs that are the same or one layer cake.

When working with the charm packs or layer cakes and wanting to utilize all the fabrics within the charm pack I start by sorting them out into piles of lights, mediums, and darks.  The charm pack I decided on was Blush by Basicgrey for Moda.

Sorted out into piles of lights, mediums, and darks.

Now I start putting them into sets of: light + medium, light + dark, or medium + dark. Once I have them arranged by value I will also vary the scale of the print I am putting with another fabric.  I usually start with the fabrics that might be hard to match up to something else.  For example the large print below will look great with this tone-on-tone, but not nearly as nice if I were to combine it with a busier print.

Below are the choices I made for grouping the fabrics from this charm pack into sets of two.

I think I came up with some pretty great sets that work well together just by using the fabrics within a charm pack.  So have fun with those charm packs you’ve been collecting and make some wonderful Nickel Quilts!

Pat

Working With Striped Fabric in the Turnabout Block

Fabrics with stripes can be fun to use in the Turnabout block; all it takes is just a little bit of planning.  The first thing you need to do is lay out the striped fabric with the stripes all going in the same direction. Next, when placing your background on top of your striped fabric, the orientation of the diagonal line needs to be same on all four squares.

These are the blocks you will get when making half-square-triangles with the stripes positioned as shown above.

If you want the stripes to go in the other direction in the block, simply change the direction the stripes are arranged to begin with before adding the background fabric. In the picture below you will see that stripes are now horizontal and the diagonal line on the background fabric remains the same.

Now your blocks will look like this.

Both sets are great looking blocks; it could be fun to make this quilt with only striped fabric as the main fabric.  Oh the possibilities and fun, making Nickel Quilts from stash fabrics!

Pat

Turnabout Block and Fabric Choices

I’ve been making lots of these Turnabout blocks and having a blast!  Working with some of these vintage and visually challenged fabrics can sometimes be tricky. Note that I did not call them ugly; that would be politically incorrect. VBG!

Some of the blocks are turning out better than others.  These are blocks that are not going to make the cut and find their way into this quilt.  The fabrics just mushed together. My spell checker is telling me “mushed” is not a word, well it is in my world.

When I auditioned the fabric squares they looked like they were going to work well together.  I think the problem is that the circles in the lighter fabric are about the same scale as some of the flowers in the blue fabric.

So back to the fabric pile to choose another light to go with this floral print. I’m not giving up on using the blue floral since I have a whole yard of it I cut up into 5″ squares. I can’t even blame it on a fat quarter trade and say someone gave it to me; it was a whole yard which means I purchased it!  So here are some lights that I thought would make a better combination with the blue floral.

And now the finished blocks! I can actually see the pattern all those wonderful picket fence units are supposed to create in this block.

Before I put some of the blocks together I took the time to see what this block would look like scrappier and not so controlled, and I like the look.

This would be a great way to make this block if you do not have sets of four for your darks and lights and are working with single squares.

Next blog:  Working with stripes in the Turnabout block.

Pat

Beach Cities Quilters and the Half-Square-Triangle and Four Patch Workshop

Last weekend I was with the Beach Cities Quilters in Mission Viejo, California.  Their workshop was on Half-Square-Triangle and Four Patches. Fifteen quilts can all be worked on in this workshop!  Before the day was over, I did manage to take a few pictures.

These are units ready to be sewn together for the Jacob’s ladder block.  The quilt is in my More Nickel Quilts book.

Blocks from two different Market Square quilts.  The Market Square quilt is in my Amazing Nickel Quilts book.  There were so many bright and fun fabrics being used in this workshop; some were from charm packets and others were stash fabrics!

A Sunny Lanes block from my Nickel Quilts book is being made in a controlled palette of greens.

These are Northern Lights blocks found in my Nickel Quilts book.  These blocks are a little scrappier than mine and they look great!  It’s a good way to use single charm squares or to alternate busier prints with blender prints.

This photo shows blocks for two different Northern Lights quilts.  The blocks on the left started with 5″ squares and the ones on the right started with 6″ squares.  Yes, you can use the same unit construction techniques, no matter what size square you start with!  If starting with a larger square, your units will just be larger and your finished blocks will be larger.  A great way to make some charity quilts!

Remember, Beach Cities Quilters: I love too see pictures of the finished quilts!

Pat

Turnabout Block – Organizing Your Fabrics and Hints on Sub Cutting

To organize the fabrics for this quilt and many of the quilts I make, I use paper plates.  The Turnabout block uses sets of four dark and sets of four light 5″ squares.  I simply dug into my tubs of squares, pulled out darks and lights, and paired them up into what I hope will make good looking blocks.

Before long I have plenty of squares chosen, paired up, and stacked on those paper plates.  As it turns out I think these stacks of squares are enough to make two large lap size quilts, I got a little carried away with pulling fabrics!

Some thoughts on all the sub cutting you will do when you make this block, note I say when and not if!

To cut down on the number of things I have to pick up and put down all the time I figured out that I like to  leave Blue Dude in one place when sub cutting the half-square-triangles. That way I’m just moving the half-square-triangles into place, cutting, removing the cut units, and replacing them with a new unit to sub cut.

Once the half-square-triangle is cut in half then I repeat the process by placing Blue Dude below the unit.  This way only the unit is put into place, sub cut and moved for the next unit.

Lucie the Happy Quilter is already giving this block a try!

Enjoy!

Pat

Half-Square-Triangles

I realized that I have not done a detailed blog posting on how I make half-square-triangles from 5″ squares, and this might be useful information for a newer quilter. So here are the basics:

Starting with two 5″ squares; one dark and one light.

1. Draw a diagonal line on the wrong side of a 5″ square of background (light) fabric. With right sides together, place the marked background square on top of a square of the main fabric.

2. Stitch a “scant” 1/4″ wide seam on both sides of the diagonal line.  I always sew my seams using a “scant” 1/4″ wide seam allowance. This is a slightly narrower seam, about a needle width narrower than the full 1/4″. This narrower seam allows for the thickness of the thread in the seam allowance, the pressing of the fabric over the seam, and results in a more accurately sized unit.  Give it a try!

3. Cut along the diagonal line to yield two half-square-triangle units.

4. Press to set the stitching; then press the seam toward the dark fabric, unless otherwise instructed in directions for the block you are making.

Next, we are going to trim the units and you will need a ruler that has a 45º diagonal line that extends to the corner of the ruler.  Also very helpful is Blue Dude to keep the ruler from slipping. I place Blue Dude between the ruler and the unit.

5. To trim the units, place the 45º diagonal line of your ruler along the seam line. Position it so that the fabric extends past the ruler on two adjacent sides, and the remaining sides extend past the 4 1/2″ lines on the ruler. Trim away the fabric that extends beyond the ruler edges.

6. Reposition the unit so that the two trimmed edges now  line up along the 4 1/2″ lines on the ruler and the 45º diagonal line is along the seam line. Trim the remaining two edges for a perfect 4 1/2″ half-square-triangle unit.

A perfect 4 1/2″ half-square-triangle unit is a thing of beauty! In my Half-Square-Triangle and Four Patch workshop participants can work on fifteen different quilts during the same workshop!

Enjoy!

Pat

Turnabout

It’s been gloomy, snowing, and raining for the past several days and I keep putting off cleaning off my longarm machine which lives in my basement. That also means I am putting off getting any quilt tops quilted. I only want to be in my attic studio piecing blocks. So guess what? I’m starting a new quilt, and it’s going to be several new quilts!  Years ago I traded 5″ squares and fat quarters (which you can cut into twelve 5″ squares) like crazy and have tubs full of them.  Many of these fabrics are well over 20 years old and need to be put into quilts, they have aged long enough!

I have the need to make quilts right now for the pure pleasure of it and not think about putting the quilt in a book or pattern which would mean; how would it photograph, is this the best fabric choice for this quilt, and writing up the pattern for publication. I just need to piece!

I’m also celebrating on July 1^st my 10 year anniversary of being able to teach quilting as my full time profession and I have been thinking what can I do to celebrate this milestone? So I am going to make and give to charity 10 quilts! I will be sharing the quilts and construction techniques on this blog so others can also share in on the fun of making these quilts.  What I want to focus on is how to make good looking quilts out of older stash fabrics and make them relatively simple.

This is my first project, I’m calling it Turnabout.  It’s made from half-square-triangle units, which are my favorite units to make.

So that you can join along with me in making this block here is the information to get you started. To make the blocks like I did you will need 4 dark 5″ squares that are from the same fabric and 4 light 5″ squares that are the same. Make half-square-triangles units and square them up to 4 1/2″, you will have 8 half-square-triangles that are all the same.

You then measure over 2 1/4″ and cut the unit in half.  Be sure to position all the units in the orientation as shown below.

Next measure over 4″ and trim 1/2″ off of the solid edge of the unit.

Arrange the light units and the dark units as shown.

Sew the seams.

Arrange the units into dark blocks and light blocks.

The finished blocks! They will finish 7″.

Have fun with this block idea and in my next blog I’ll give some additional pointers on working with this block.

Pat