Quilt Blocks – NEW EVERY MORNING

Jelly Roll Bargello Quilt – progress and a free pattern

July 1, 2020 by Allison Reid

I’m making good progress with the Bargello quilt experiment.

The story so far: I’m using a Jelly Roll for fabric and have had a couple of attempts at designing and making blocks. My first pattern proved to be a bit too fiddly – for my tastes anyway – with the narrowest strips cut just ¾” wide. Before making the second block I changed the cutting measurements to no narrower than 1½” wide – much better! The thrid block I made was identical to the second… Or so I thought…. Doh! I mis-read my pencil pattern and had cut a couple of strips to the finished measurements with no seam allowances! A bit of unpicking had to happen! Thankfully there was enough left-over fabric for me to cut strips of the correct width to complete the block.

Then I had to bite the bullet and make the fourth block using my original narrow cutting measurements. When that was made I could sew all four blocks together and stand back to see the pattern flowing over the quilt top. So this is a bit of an experimental quilt top. I’m pleased I achieved my aims of designing and making Bargello blocks AND in the process used all forty Width Of Fabric strips from the Jelly Roll.

Four blocks stitched together – 50″ x 40″

Bargello – it turns out not to be as scary as it looks! I thought I’d write up my cutting and piecing instructions and share them. If you’ve shied away from this block in the past why not give it a go using my pattern, Basic Bargello Block -July 2020? All you need are ten width of fabric strips cut 2½” wide. Follow the method shared in the pattern – looking back at the photo tutorial in my ‘Jelly Roll Bargello Quilt – first block, step by step‘ blog post should help – and give it a go! Ten WOF fabric strips will make a block measuring 28″ x 20″.

Download the pdf Basic Bargello Block pattern here: Basic Bargello Block -July 2020

Let me know how you get on if you do give Bargello a try. Link up via my Facebook page, or use @allisonreid.neweverymorning on Instagram. I’d love to see versions of this pattern made in other colourways 🙂

Linking with Susan for Midweek Makers. Susan is busy designing rather than making at the moment but there are a whole host of bloggers from the Worldwide Quilting Community sharing their inspiring quilt projects in her link-up this week.

Allison

Saturday Quilting Bring and Share (113)

June 27, 2020 by Allison Reid

Welcome to Saturday Quilting Bring & Share 🙂 I hope you have had a good week and can enjoy some time being creative this weekend. Bring along your project(s), relax and enjoy some of the inspiration being shared by other members of our Worldwide Quilting Community. Do leave your thoughts and links in the comments box at the end of this page.

I have been steadily working away designing and making Bargello blocks using a Jelly Roll of rainbow fabrics designed by Jen Kingwell. See my Instagram feed, @allisonreid.neweverymorning, for the updates I’ve been posting through the week.

Rainbow strip sets lined up on my design wall.

I made four strip sets by dividing the Jelly Roll into identical groups of ten strips (see this post for the method I used). The first strip set made a block measuring 22″ wide by 20″ long. I like the block (top left in the photo below) but the construction was too fiddly with the narrowest segments finishing just ½” wide. I went back to the graph paper and modified my design so no strips were cut narrower than 1½”, finishing 1″ wide. The revised design yielded a block measuring 28″ x 20″ (top right).

Today I made a second block (bottom right) using the revised design. And now I have a dilemma… I have one more strip set to make into Bargello block. Should I bite the bullet, go back to the first fiddly-twiddly design, make a block identical to the first and then join all four together? Or should I make a third block using the revised design and stitch the three together, keeping the smaller, original block as a wall hanging or table topper? Humm?

Enough of my dilemmas, here are some links into the inspiring Worldwide Quilting Community:

Michelle has had a positive experience donating a quilt to a charity auction and gives some thoughts on the process.

Christina Cameli has found herself editing her latest video class. All set up to record the class at home with Bluprint giving long distance support Christina found herself caught up in the ‘bitter lemon’ of Bluprint’s demise. Once over the shock she decided lemonade could be made from this situation and, aided by her daughter, Christina has filmed and edited the class 🙂

A new book, ‘ Love Your Creative Space – A visual guide to Creating an Organised and Inspiring Studio Without Breaking the Bank’ is reviewed by Teri who has been taking on board lots of the advice and sharing some of the inspiration as she plans her new sewing room.

I have really enjoyed watching Yvonne Fuchs’ latest quilt taking shape. ‘Mum’s Garden’ is a modern design with curved piecing and a very unusual colour palette. Well worth a click and a long look 🙂

Linking with Alycia for Finished (or Not ) Friday.

Happy Stitching!

Allison

Jelly Roll Bargello Quilt – first block, step by step

June 25, 2020 by Allison Reid

So, designing and making a Bargello quilt, how hard can it be? 😀

There are plenty of Bargello patterns to be bought, found in books or available for free on the ‘interweb’… but none seemed to quite fit the fabric quantities I had available or the idea I had in my head…

Not only are there plenty of patterns available there are also a considerable number of cutting and piecing methods to choose from – both to follow in books and watch on YouTube. It took me a couple of days to assimilate the information I’d found, play around with pencil and eraser and look wistfully at the fabrics. Finally it was time to put a plan into action 🙂

Fabric: I used a Moda Jelly Roll, ‘Circulus’ by Jen Kingwell Designs, forty width of fabric strips cut 2½” wide. This collection conveniently has four each of ten colours making it easy for me to sort them into four matching sets. Other Jelly Rolls would need more careful sorting and maybe a few substitutions to replace those fabrics that wouldn’t play well in a Bargello pattern i.e. large, widely spaced designs which could break up the pattern across the quilt top.

The method: After much deliberation and many ‘huhs?’ followed by a few light-bulb moments I decided to employ a strip piecing ‘tube’ method to make this Bargello quilt. After all the research, I found most affinity with a tip-filled

Quilters Color Quest: 8. Context

June 18, 2020 by Allison Reid

Context: The next challenge in the Quilters Color Quest organised by Rachel Hauser author of ‘The Quilter’s Field Guide to Color’.

The Cambridge Dictionary defines ‘context’ as:

the situation within which something exists or happens, and that can help explain it…

Most examples of how to use the word ‘context’ are geared towards words and ideas, obviously for the Quilter’s Color Quest we are thinking fabrics and how they relate to one another on a quilt top. The swatch challenge involved grouping shades, tones and tints of a colour around a swatch deemed to be the pure, classic hue (colour). I had a go with Apple Green, Blackberry and Sapphire. Our perceptions of a colour will alter depending on the other colours