Ready, set, go!

 This week I am participating in something 

completely different, a strip block race! 

Never having sewn for speed,

 I am not sure what to expect!

I'm sewing on a featherweight so 

it is pretty speedy.

All oiled and ready to go!

We're to prepare our strips any 

way we like so I am setting mine

up like I do when I sew them at home. 

The finished block size is 10" cut.

I do have some design boards I use

to set up my scrap blocks. 

My BB made them for me.

They work wonderfully for laying 

out all kinds and of blocks. 

You can see they have had a lot of use!

I don't think they will be used in this

project but I have used them for 

crumb and string blocks as well as 

blocks with many units.

The blocks for "race" will be 

10" cut so I will precut some 

strips to make the correct size.

After a few trials, here is what I've

come up with!

The blocks for the race need to be 

made with strips/strings 2" wide or

less. The corners can be triangles

cut form 4" or 5" squares.

Soo..

I cut a bunch of 10" papers,

gave them a diagonal fold to 

keep me straight,

and started looking for strips.  

Then I organized them into piles 

that matched my sewing order

and I am ready! I have these convenient

totes for them too!

My practice one worked okay and 

I think I can make about 20 in the 

2 hour time limit!  It should be fun!

The  sew along is 

moving right along.  All the diamonds 

have their sides.  Eventually,

after 3 tries at cutting side triangles,

I ended up paper piecing the finishing 

sides. Even though I'm not fond of 

paper piecing, it sure makes precise

corners and seam allowances!

This was actually step 7 if you've visited the you tube channel.

 

Step 6 was a very cute periwinkle block.

I used a template to cut the periwinkle shape

out of scraps strips of blue. 

Then outside oversized triangles were 

added. Trim the whole thing down to 

3 1/2" and they were finished!

It was not too hard once I figured out the 

proper system to maintain a 1/4" seam allowance!

Now on to step 8. 

First, the beige rectangles ( step 1)are snowballed. 

This uses up all the plain brown squares from step 3.

The brown blocks are pressed in half to mark the stitching line. 

The off cuts are used to make hourglass units. 

One creative sewer, stitches down the side of the 

square to make 1/2 of the hourglass and the snowball 

all at once.

It only requires 32 hourglass blocks so 

 leftovers can be made into pinwheels for 

use in another project!

Step 8 is well on its way !

Off to the race!

Stay safe and sew on !

Linking up with:

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