Hi!  I feel a bit back to normal after doing some much anticipated piecework yesterday.  I had missed it and wished I had a few more Saturdays to keep it going.  Alas, work is back again tomorrow and today we try to focus on housework and homework.

I found Block 4 of Reach for the Stars to be much more complicated than it needed to be.  Here’s the center of the block:

My problem with the piecing was with the two longest white print strips in the center.  The middle section should be 6 1/2″ unfinished, but they wanted you to cut those strips 7 1/4″ long and then add triangles to the end.  I sewed, unsewed, sewed, unsewed, cussed a little, put it down, came back and decided that I knew how to make what I needed – just in my own way.  I cut the strips down to 6 1/2″ long and then sewed a square of fabric to each end, on the diagonal and did the stitch and flip method.  Perfect.  Easy.  The same thing applied to the other strips they wanted cut at 7 1/4″.  Just cut them 6 1/2″ and sew the squares on the end and trim the corners off.  Trust me on this.

Here is my finished Block #4.  I used more of my panel piece from Palm Court in the center, the black polka dot from Little Black Dress II, the small cream/black floral from American Gothic, and the light outer border and sashing strips are also from Little Black Dress II.    One of the interesting aspects of this quilt design is that four (?) of the blocks use a lighter sashing, and the others use almost a solid black.

So, that brings me to my center medallion and four blocks done.  I’m pretty sure the other two blocks in this months issue of Quilters Newsletter will go much faster.  I wanted to tackle Block 4 for two reasons yesterday – I can hardly stand to go out of order and I wanted to get the most difficult one done first.

Now – for a special progress parade from my two newfound quilt friends who are also doing Reach for the Stars!

First up is Jennifer Thacker from Houston, Texas.  Jennifer searched out for all of the original inspiration fabric and found most of it.  She has her center medallion done here:

Jennifer Thacker – Center Medallion

And has also completed her Block 1 (another tricky one I think)…

Jennifer Thacker – Block 1

She’s off to a great start.  I’ve invited her to a play date soon, and maybe we can work on this project together!  I would love a grown up play date!  Think about it Jennifer!

Sherri Crisp, from Knoxville, Tennessee is going gang busters on this quilt!  She started off on the center medallion as well, but then reconsidered her fabric placement and unpicked it to add more contrast.  Here is her parade of blocks!!

Sherri Crisp – Center Medallion

Sherri Crisp – Block 1

Sherri Crisp – Block 2

Sherri Crisp – Block 3

Sherri Crisp – Block 4

Sherri Crisp – Group Photo

Ladies – keep them coming!!  Finally, please hop over to Dawn’s blog, First Light Designs, to see her activity.  She loves this quilt so much, she is making it twice!!  In two different color ways!  Please check it out!  (for some reason my hyperlinks are not obvious anymore since my blog upgrade… so here is the URL for Dawn’s blog:  http://firstlightdesigns.com/)

I hope to see you again soon … I have my BOM delivery from Fat Quarter Shop due early this week … another Avalon house block to put together and I’ll be 75% of the way through the blocks!

Have a great Sunday and end to February (can you believe it??).  Thanks for stopping by!

Jennifer

Same song, second verse.  First – another ‘ice’ day for the kids and I stayed home Tuesday.  Doing more work this time than playing unfortunatley.  I did get Block 2 pieced though in my Reach for the Stars project.

Only one more block to do from the second issue in the project series … the third issue is waiting with the next three blocks already.  Left to right, the first three issues of Quilters Newsletters that is running the Reach for the Stars project:

Once I saw the first issue, I immediately went online and subscribed for a year to the magazine so I would have home delivery of the next six to complete the quilt.

Block 2 was not as hard for me as Block 1 (see prior post).  I had decided to not spend my time figuring out the shortcuts for the sub block units (like the hour glass ones you see below).  I just cut as the directions indicated, bias edges all OVER the place, and went for it.  I’m very shocked that it came out perfectly!  Those little triangles started off as squares and then were cut on the diagonal twice to yield 32 of them.  The hour glass units are 2 1/2″ unfinished.

I need to find a handy cheat sheet for making common quilt units that provide the cutting instructions and various finished sizes.  That would be really handy.  Any suggestions are welcome.

Here’s a closeup of Block 2, with more fussy cutting in the center.  I used the “grunge” fabric choice from Little Black Dress 2 for the background in this block.  The black/cream small prints are from American Gothic and the center is from Palm Court.  The polka dot is also Little Black Dress 2:

So – here’s what I have so far! (Why is this picture blurry!  Aaarrrggg!  Next pictures will have to wait until a bright day outside)

I guess I’ll have to move my center medallion block off the design wall to make more room now.  I really like looking at it though.  I think this may be my favorite all time quilt project.

I was eager to catch up with Dawn over at First Light Designs – but as I was loading up my pictures last night – I saw that she just posted AGAIN!  She now has the first three blocks done in addition to the center medallion.  Check out her post – her pictures are stunning!  She also offers an alternate way to make the hourglass blocks without the bias edges and small triangles.  Looks like it worked great for her too!

We are also joined by two non-bloggers, Jennifer from Katy and Sherri from Knoxville.  Anyone else out there Reaching for the Stars??

Have a great week!

Jennifer

Well, Houston got a teeny tiny taste of the northern chill that is happening this winter.  We were hit with freezing precipitation overnight and all schools were closed today.  Rock-Paper-Scissors and I was the one staying home with the kids.

I plan to make the most of it.  A little work, a little playing with the kids and a little quilting.

I got my fat 8th bundle of Little Black Dress 2 yesterday in the mail, so I was able to complete the center medallion of Reach for the Stars.  I also added the first outer sashing strip.  Right now it is 26″ square unfinished.

I have to wait for my extra yardage from FQS to put on the second sashing – but no worries – I am now officially 6 blocks behind on this quilt.  I have enough to work on while I’m waiting.

My Quilters Newsletter magazine came in the mail yesterday also and it has the instructions for Blocks 4 – 5 – 6.  When I say ‘instructions’, I mean that they put a picture of the block with the pieces labeled and the cut sizes of the pieces and that’s about it.  There’s no measurements given for the sub-blocks as you go along, like I’m so used to with the FQS patterns (and a lot of patterns actually).  That was a challenging part of completing the center because it was so large and a little complex with the side triangles and such.

If you are making the quilt and have just started – I’m happy to share the sizes of any sub-blocks if you need them.  Also, I wish I had thought before I cut when I went to make the HST for the outer ring.  The instructions for cutting have you sewing the two smaller triangles together to make a single HST.  I should have used large squares and sewn them into two units – but it’s done now.

I also wanted to share a picture of this project from Sherri Crisp, from Knoxville, TN.  She’s quilting along too!  So happy to have some other people to bounce ideas and pictures around with.  Sherri is doing hers with a fantastic rich brown paisley focus fabric and creams.  She is also, so far, doing it by foundation paper piecing.  I have never used this technique, but it is on my bucket list for this year.  I can’t wait to see hers develop also.  She doesn’t have a blog, but I asked her if I could share her pictures as we go along.  Thanks Sherri!

Stay warm and thanks for visiting today!

Jennifer