Midnight Blues

As you all know, Bonnie Hunters leader & ender project for 2019/2020 is the shoofly block. She gives a very detailed tutorial how to make the blocks.

This was the incentive I needed to start piecing shoofly blocks but I'm not piecing my blocks the way Bonnie describes. I'm doing them my own way which works for me!

I like the precision of foundation paper piecing so I've made my triangles with 1-1/2" finished Thangles papers. I also didn't make the center block larger. In my block, each of the 9 sections is the same size.

I needed a total of 162 shoofly blocks which means I needed 648 HST's. Got them done but piecing the blocks had to wait because August was just a busy month. 

It's September now and the shoofly blocks are finished, all 162 of them.

Now I need 161 snowball blocks but I'm not piecing those yet. I think piecing those blocks sound like a good mindless sewing project to take along to retreat in November.

The cream squares in the above picture are for the snowball blocks, the squares for the flippy corners are cut. I'll work on marking a diagonal line on the back of those so they're ready to sew at the retreat.

Earlier this summer I did piece 4 snowball blocks to see how they looked with the shoofly blocks. Before I cut the flippy corners off the snowball, I sewed a 2nd seam. I cut between the seams, now I have these tiny little HST's. I'll wait to press then until after all the corners have been sewn, then they have to be trimmed. I have no idea what they'll be but I know this, it will be very small. 

I guess Judy Hanson from Small Quilts & Doll Quilts is making an impression on me. Judy also attends the Jane Stickle quilt retreat. Over the years I have gifted her with many tiny pieces. Her small quilts are so cute!

I'm using mediums and dark blues for this quilt which are already in my stash. I've used at least 25 different blues but so many of them are very dark deep blue/black so I've named this quilt Midnight Blues. Midnight Blues is a lot easier then to say shoofly & snowballs.

I first posted about my project in July. If I make this quilt like I'm planning now, there will be an applique border included or maybe I'll embroider the border . . . I'll decide when the center is pieced.

I know my project isn't a leader & ender project like Bonnie's but, my quilt, my way.

Linking to Midweek Makers, Needle & Thread Thursday, For the Love of Geese, Peacock Party