I’m bee mama for October for  the Siblings Together Bee 2 so it’s my turn to come up with a block for my fellow bee mates. Last time I was mama our joint efforts produced these beauties.

 

 

Siblings Together is a wonderful charity that brings together separated siblings in the UK care system for a holiday. Given the typical cool of a UK summer evening the idea came up that a quilt should be given to each child as a momento of their holiday. Enter quilters from all over the world who make blocks and quilts and altogether annually over 100 quilts are made and given.

In wracking my brains for a block idea my aim was to deplete my ever crammed scrap jars which are full of those awkward  sized scraps.  I also remembered this wonderful scrappy quilt by Katie Pedersen. Whilst this version is simpler and not on point those controlled squares with scrappy points are similar.*

You can probably work out what to do from the picture of the block but if you want to see how I did it then follow the details below.  The only thing I’d ask is that the background is a  solid white or white on white print  not cream/grey/other low volume (I used Kona Snow and a white on white print) and the scraps are on the bright side.

 

So here goes.

You will need 16 white 5 inch squares and a bunch of bright scraps, minimum width 2.5″. I’m pleased to say making 3 of these blocks made visible space in my scrap jars.  Yay!!  (Mind you I did these blocks a few weeks back and the jars are full again –  how does that happen?)

 

To make one block, which should end up 16.5″ square, you will need to make the following. If you have a 4.5″ square ruler it will make life easier.

Firstly for the left hand pieces in the photo. Choose some bright scraps that will fit – triangle shaped pieces are perfect but they need to be minimum width 2.5″.

Select a couple of scraps  making sure they will fit ….

Whilst not bothering to measure precisely aim for them to be in the range of 2″ – 4″ up each side of the white square. And where they meet there should be at least 1″ between the crossover point and the bottom of the square as below.

Then stitch down one of them and  roughly trim

and flip over and iron or finger press ….

Add the next piece, again no precise measurement needed other than to ensure the crossover point is a min 1″ from the bottom. Stitch down…

Again roughly trim …..

Flip over,  press and trim to 4.5″

 

For the other 2 types of blocks just do one corner on 4 of the 5″ white squares and 2 opposite corners on the remaining 4 of the 5″ white squares using the same method. Finally trim all down to 4.5″ inches.

Assemble the pieces as below and sew together and then trim to 16.5″ square. Best to use a scant 1/4″.

If my bee mates could make 1 block each that would be fab. If you feel like you can make 2 that would be wonderful. I will need 20 for a smallish quilt or 25 for a bigger quilt  and 3 have been done.

Many thanks everyone.  Any queries please do get in touch. For speedy response please email me on thelilaccat@yahoo.com

* Some of you may be following the current debate within the Modern Quilt Guild about derivative quilts  and the need to always see permission if you are inspired by a particular quilt, not so much for personal use, but certainly  for quilts that end up in more public settings like a quilt show. I touch on it here. The MQG  in fact have withdrawn their original post which caused such a furore but I still believe in attribution and just in case I checked with Katie Pedersen. She is the sort of generous quilter that believes her designs derive from techniques that are open to anybody. Having read some of the debates and posts about this topic not all quilters take that stance and are much more precious about their designs. Thanks Katie.

Linking up to Nicky of Mrs Sew and Sow for Scraptastic Tuesday