just a *little* more

The downside of my system for designing quilts

- graph paper, pencil and eraser -
(and minimal drawing skills)

is 

sometimes what looks good on paper,

doesn't look quite right 

life size.

Especially when one depicts a 16 inch swoon block

with a simple 'S'.

~

Jordan's quilt is a mash up of this stunning epic swoon

and

Jeni's gorgeous sparkling cider vintage sheet quilt.

I  ordered both the 16" swoon pattern

and the sparkling cider pattern.

Neither were overly helpful;

the swoon, because I'm not making it exactly like the pattern,

so I've had to re-figure everything,

and the sparkling cider pattern

was pretty much a joke.

But at least I don't feel like I'm stealing anybody's design....

The sparkling cider pattern,

which is made of rectangles and sawtooth stars

calls for some pretty good sized pieces of fabric

(6.5 x 10.5 & 6.5 x 16.5, to be precise)

and I incorporated that into my design.

Which looked perfectly fine 

in that quilt,

and on paper,

but the next largest piece of fabric in my design

is 4.5 inches.

And my smallest pieces of fabric 

are the corners of flying geese blocks that finish at 1 x 2 inches.

The more blocks I added to my wall,

the more I realized

 that those big chunks of fabric

just wouldn't do for Jordan's quilt.

Jordan taught me how to do 'cat eye' eyeliner - so I *really* wanted to include make-up fabric in the quilt.
After 2+ hours of looking, this was the only fabric I found that I thought would work.
Never mind that it doesn't actually have eyeliner on it...

So last Friday,

I decided I needed to 'break up the expanse'

with some smaller (4") sawtooth stars.

Over the course of the weekend,

I made a dozen.

Monday I pulled my 'pattern' out

and decided I needed 20 more.

They're so cute,

I was eager to make a few every chance I got,

and once the fabric was cut,

each block averaged about 22 minutes

(It's hard to say exactly, because my sewing time is so interrupted)

I still have a couple of swoon blocks,

3 firework(ish) blocks

(at 8 inches - those are fiddly, let me tell you!)

and a half dozen 8 inch stars to make,

but since I've finished all 32 of these 'extra' 4" stars,

I'm calling it a mini finish

and linking up with Amanda Jean

(I've also finished all of the 6" sawtooth stars,

and all of the other i-don't-know-what-to-call-them 6 inch blocks.)