Stash busting (again!)

You might have heard me say over the years that when I have fabric left over from a quilting project I slice it up into narrow strips. I have a huge crate full of these strips, all perfect for adding bindings to a new quilt, or for making quick work of log cabin or courthouse steps patchwork. Recently I’ve been adding to this stash with some hand dyed fabrics I bought sight unseen. These turned out to be a very lightweight cotton – too thin for regular patchwork but excellent for anything worked onto a foundation. So, I’ve cut a number of eight inch foundation squares from some cotton blinds I recently replaced. I love to recycle! The first strip is laid from corner the corner on the square and the second lined up on top of it. My strips are different widths but none narrower than one and a quarter inches or wider than two inches. I’ve also been consistent to place the first strip as a dark blue/grey on every block. I press every seam and continue adding more strips either side of the first untill the whole of the cream foundation is covered.

The block looks really untidy at first but I flip it over and use a rotary cutter to trim the excess fabrics back to the edge of the foundation. This keeps everything nice and square and stitching onto the foundation prevents distortion at the same time as making the fabric more substantial.

At the moment I haven’t decided how I’m going to join these blocks. I’ve just plonked them on the floor for the purpose of these photos. The colours are pretty randomly placed except for the consistent grey strip at the centre of each block. In the arrangement here those strips create a suggestion of a grid which I do quite like. There are a number of other things I might do with the blocks though. They could be sliced in half and sewn to plain fabrics to make half square triangles for instance. Maybe I could sash them with a single colour to make the overall effect more controlled? I think I’ll have to make lots more blocks before I can make up my mind. It’s a good job they are so quick to do. I’m always such a control freak with my quilts so it’s hard for me to use so many random colours and to have so few seams line up. Wish me luck!

Bye for now.  Linda x