Saturday Sharing

Although it is just a few days until Thanksgiving a group of us decided to forego the pre-holiday grocery shopping by getting together to try out an interesting and easy quilt block design. Seven of us gathered at the Elmgrove Community Room and worked on a hexagon shaped block from a pattern called Merry-Go-Round in McCall's Quilting Magazine.


A hexagon shaped block is based on a six-sided motif rather than the traditional four sided block. For a traditional look at this design see here. For a more modern (read fast and easy) take on the hexagon the Merry-Go-Round is made using two, two and a half inch strips of fabric sewn together longways, then sub-cut into equilateral triangles. If you use strips of fabric cut from one selvage to the other selvage of typical quilting cottons, you will get two blocks out of each strip - one with, as a for instance, red in the middle and black on the outside, while the other would be black on the inside and red on the outside. The easy piecing comes when you assemble the hexagons... just sew units of three like triangles at a time and combine into rows like a traditional quilt.


Even though I had sewn the strips together before we got together I did not complete all the blocks needed for even a lap size quilt in the time we had. Here's just a sample of what I got done:

I used a strip set (also called a Jelly Roll) from Moda called Winter so my fabrics are fairly coordinated. Others in the group went for a completely scrappy look while one was thinking of making her's completely out of blue fabrics. I think all of these combinations work though I must admit that I was a little surprised that my Winter Jelly Roll included lots of strips with candy canes on them rather than a more generic look.


BTW - if you have seen the 'One Block Wonder' books or quilts.. this is a similar technique and you can mix and match construction techniques between the two patterns with good results.


I hope we do this again. It was a no fuss, no muss kind of day. There was no pressure to complete anything in the time we had at the facility. We learned a new block, solved some of the problems in the world and had some great pizza for lunch. Heck, I even got to change the battery in the smoke alarm at the building and Ms. M. vaccumed after we were done so we left the place in better shape than we found it in. Thanks to the Misses L., J., F., C., M. and R. for making this a great day.

Oh, one other thing... Thanks to the person who found this pattern and actually made one that got everyone jazzed up on learning this block. To me, you are a quilting rock star. Thank you!