quilt bee blocks - stars and such

April is a busy quilt bee month for me with a double hitter in Around the Block. Both Rachel and Susie requested blocks for quilts for their boys.  It's always fun to work in kid-themed fabrics. I'm a sucker for robots, rockets and cowboys.

Rachel had a great gallery of inspiration which pointed to simple, offcenter shapes. Her direction said a bit of wonkiness is fine. She sent us Riley Blake fabric and solids, themed around stars and circles. I think the addition of solids really makes the prints pop. Looking at them now, my blocks sit safely in the Drunk Love style.

Susie's little boy, Gryff, is getting a space themed quilt. She sent assorted rocket themed fabrics in bright tones. She wasn't specific as to block type suggesting log cabins, robots, rockets and squares. Anything that worked with the space-theme. On a late night sewing bender, I thought I would try my hand at stars. Had it not been 3am or so when I started, I don't know if I would have braved this pattern.

I found a star quilt that I thought may suit by sonyaartisania which led me to a paper piecing tutorial. I scaled the blocks down to 6" each and then used just four of them. Instead of paper piecing, I printed the pattern on freezer paper and just pieced it all together on the machine tediously.

It was a huge learning exercise for me I can now bravely tackle inset seams.


With these blocks, I'm nearly wrapped for April. I've just got a couple more blocks for Tanya for The Beehive and then I'm onto the Urban Home Goods Swap.  April is shaping up to be quite a creative month in our house. I hope it is for you too!

And if you're a regular reader of Badskirt and you're wondering where the toys have gone... there's big news coming very very soon! Woof Woof!