Part 1 Quilting Sawtooth Stars

    

     I apologize about the absence of the blog last week.  Last two weeks have been eventful. Kenzie and  Jason were sick.  He is getting better with rest. I have good days and bad. I have rheumatoid arthritis and fibromyalgia. All I can say is you don’t want it, either one. It hurts. I totallly understand your pain, for those that have either of these. I have pain meds and other meds, and meds for meds. LOL Even though I am joking around about it. It sucks. It can get in the way of sewing. My shoulder hurts from cutting. If I push myself to hard, I make mistakes. So, I have to slow down and be patient. Patience is a virtue that skipped me. I am trying to learn it.

   ***  Back to the point. ***

I have made quilts for others.  So, I am ready to focus on a quilt for our bed. I absolutely fell in love with the teal print of the star. I am also very fond of the  star too. I was trying to work with hexagons, but I chickened out. Haha. I will get to them, eventually. So, the first part of this quilt will be shown today. There is more, I may stick some other projects in  between as filler weeks.

The total project size will be for a queen bed.

The first part is

36 10” blocks of Sawtooth  Stars

What you will need for these:

3 yards of star material

3 1/4 of beige material

Cutting mat, ruler, rotary cutter. They will be your friends.

For teal 10” sawtooth star  dark fabric cuts:

1 (5 1/2”) square for the middle

8 (3”) squares.

I am also going to do smaller stars and alternate these with sashing. this is for 8  (10” ) stars across and 9 down on the quilt. This is just half of the total blocks. I am going to sew all 36 together.  Then, start on the small ones. The other blocks will come at you next week, fingers crossed.

 

I already started on these. So, I took my 44” wide fabric that comes folded in half. I folded it again. Then measured 5 1/2” and cut. I divided 44/5.5= 8. I need 5 strips cut. You can layer the fabric and try to cut bulk. I did just two layers at a time, and as I became comfortable with my friends, (referenced above) cut more layers at a time. So, 1 yard was pretty much devoted for these 5 1/2” block.

Here’s my stacks of 3” inch blocks and 5 1/2” squares. That took me several days. I am proud of those stacks. I put lots of ice on the shoulder for them too. That tall stack is 100 3” blocks. My camera just bites, and I am really looking forward to getting a new camera.

Now, for the second part.

I took the beige fabric. I needed 4  (3”x5 1/2”) rectangles and 4 (3”) squares per block. I started cutting,again. At least, after this, I can start sewing blocks together.

I am taking that fabric that was already folded in half (this is how it comes off the bolt) and folded it in half again. Then, I measure 3” strip length and cut. I took strip set of 4x36 blocks= 144. Then divide 42 width of fabric/5.5”=7 blocks per 3” strip. 144/7=20 3 inch strips. 2 yards will get that, and then some for any error.

 

This is squaring up the fabric.

This is cutting to get the straight edge.

This is a 3”x5 1/2” strip.

The end is to short for the rectangle. So, I unfolded them, and cut 3” squares. I made those cuts until I had enough for 36 blocks.

I started on my 3” squares.

Time for the next part. I laid the pieces out for sewing.

After laying out the pieces. I want to lay a 3” block right sides down on the 3”x5 1/2” block I am going to sew a line from the outer right corner to the left side of the bottom corner.

Here 2…

here. Now, sew that seam. Take it to the iron, and set the stitching. Just place the iron down. This helps to make the seam secure.

Now take the bottom part of the fabric and trim it 1/4” from the bottom seam.

Then, press down the point.

Now, take another 3” square face down. Sew this from the outside top left to bottom inner corner. Press the seam to set. Cut the bottom piece off leaving a 1/4 inch from seam.  Press the triangle down.

Now, repeat on all 4 sides.

Now, we are going to connect by sewing in rows.

Pin, the bottom corners face down on each side, and then sew them 1/4” seam.

.

Then, connect sides to the middle.

Then, the top. Setting and pressing between.

Now, sew each of the rows together. Start with the bottom, turn this up  onto the middle. Then, the middle to the top. Make sure that you do your best to line up the seams.

This is your 10” block. I am happy with it. Now, I have to do 35 more of these. Oh joy. I am looking forward to getting those complete. Next time will be a different block. You could use this block throughout the whole quilt. It would be pretty that way. All you have to do is a little math for dimensions to your quilt.  This sawtooth star pattern was found on http://heyquilty.com with Mary Fons. She gives dimensions for 6”,8” and 10” inch blocks on her sight.

After all the blocks are done, I am going to show you how to sew as you go. This will make it easy to quilt all your pieces together. Instead of trying to sew the whole queen on a regular machine. The fabric can get very heavy. It can slip, pull, and pucker. I truly want to avoid all that. Blog at you later.