One year on, 12 Sampler blocks and almost there…

It’s growing – in quiet moments I’ve been piecing Irish Chain and Sampler blocks for the Sweetest Things Sampler, which we begun a year ago.

I’m especially loving the little beehive peeking out there, and Michelle’s strawberry basket – reminding me of warm, sunny days.

Both myself and Michelle at CreativeBlonde have designed 6 Sampler blocks each, for the Sweetest Things Sampler. You can find our free templates and tutorials for each block on the Sweetest Things Sampler page of Honeybee Cloths. Including the twelfth block – “Sew happy” by Michelle, which is especially sweet.

I’ve thoroughly enjoyed each of the blocks and Michelle’s block, with it’s lovely little sewing machine, and cotton reels (that seem to me, to be doing a joyful jig) really is the essence of “sewing a little happiness.”

Now all 12 Sampler blocks and 13 Irish Chain blocks are complete, it’s time to join them together.

In preparation, lay the Sampler blocks out in order you’d like them, interspersing them with Irish Chain blocks.

Next, working from the top row down, we’re going to sew the 10.5″ blocks in each of the rows together, using a 1/4″ seam allowance.

If you’re using the Quilt As You Go technique using a 3 Layer Quilt sandwich, (Method 2 in the Quilt Construction notes PDF). Then blocks are joined in 3 steps….

Step. 1 Peel back the top layer of each quilt sandwich along the edges to be joined. Pin top layers right sides together and sew.

(I used a couple of safety pins, to keep the wadding / backing away from the edge being joined.)

Now, the top layers of both blocks are joined, press the seam.

Step 2. Next, smooth the wadding over the seam. You’ll find the wadding overlaps, so trim one edge of wadding so that when smoothed flat the edges of the wadding touch. Overstitch the edges to hold in place.

Step 3. Finally, smooth over the backing pieces, folding under the backing edge of one block so that it overlaps the backing of the neighbouring block. Pin, then hand-stitch the backing in place.

Join the 2nd row, and subsequent rows in turn, till you have 5 rows, each measuring approx. 10.5″ x 50.5″

Using the same technique (Steps 1 to 3) sew the rows together, to form a quilt top, measuring approx. 50.5″ x 50.5″

If you choose, you can add borders to make a 60″ x 60″ quilt, cut:

1. Border fabric (4) 5.5 ” x 62” strips (4) 5.5 x 52″ strips

1. Cotton wadding (2) 6″ x 62″ strips (2) 6″ x 52″

To sew the borders on the quilt, I used the following shortcut, for each of the 4 border sections, attaching the shorter border sections to either side of the quilt first:

1. Pin both front and back borders along the edge of the quilt sandwich, both front and back, making sure border pieces and quilt sandwich are right sides together.

2. Next machine through all layers (borders and quilt sandwich in one go.)

3. Sew the wadding onto the seam allowance, then fold top and lower border over the  wadding.

We are almost there. Just the binding left to do, which is for next time.

Till then, from our little hive to yours

Happy sewing,

Dawn  x X