Sunday 16 June 2013

Bungle Jungle Green and Navy Block

Here goes the first strip block.

Green and Navy strip block

This is roughly what I did...

Cut a strip approx 2.5-2.75 inches wide off each layer cake square. I used a quilting ruler and mat to make sure I was getting this approximate width, but then purposefully cut the line a bit wonky alongside the ruler edge.
ruler used as a guide for width, but not to actually cut the fabric
cut fabric showing wonky-ness of the cut
 I cut 7 different fabric strips from a selection of the green fabrics with some navy and white fabrics thrown in for highlights and contrast.

cut strips overlaid to give an idea of how they will look together
The next step was to roughly cut each strip into 3 or 4 smaller rectangles, and then begin playing around to get a layout of about 5 lines to start with. This layout seemed to work as a starting point. Don't forget that once sewn the overall size will be quite a bit smaller given the number of seams.
layout before sewing strips together

Get out the sewing machine and sew the small rectangles together to form 5 strips. I still used a 1/4inch seam, but again, not too fussed if the sewn line was a little wonky or if angles weren't straight - this is what I wanted, improvising! Then press seams.
little rectangles sewn together into 5 strips
Lay out the strips on a cutting mat (not pictured) to recheck if you need to add more rectangles to each strip, or more strips to get the finished block size you are after.
I was happy with what I had, but had some skinny bits of fabrics so pieced together & added a skinny line 3 rows down.  Then the next step was to sew each strip to the next and press. Again, I purposefully stitched these rows together on a bit of an angle and with a bit of 'wonk'.

Later...After sewing up the other coloured blocks (that I will blog about later) & beginning to play around with an overall design for the quilt I decided to add another strip.
Don't do the next step until you have finished all your floating blocks & have worked out the sizes you want for each block. This picture shows measuring and lining up the quilting ruler to square up the final block.