The BOM is back!!!

Okay, I had a few moments the other day so I decided to try to catch up on my BOMs. I've been busy with the Hexy quilt and the Buzz Lightyear quilt but now that they have been given to my loved ones, it's time for some "me" sewing. Technically this is a work in progress and a block "finish" so I will be linking up at WIP Wednesdays at Freshly Pieced and Richard & Tanya's Link a Finish Friday.

Here is the block:

This is one of the June (I know, it's almost September) blocks for the Craftsy Block of the Month. It's called a Greek Cross. The cross was supposed to be all the same fabric, but I have been using only scraps and I thought these scraps would work even if they are not the same color. While doing it, I also learned about the ever popular "scant" 1/4 inch seam. It basically means that you sew the seams just a little bit under the 1/4 inch mark to make up for the area taken up by the stitch itself. It helps to keep highly pieced blocks from shrinking in size the more you sew pieces together. It worked nicely. There is another June block called the Octagon, which looks easy, but I have not got to that one yet. I am also doing the Quilt Story BOM, for which I am still on June as well :(

I also wanted to mention some of my useful tools that I used:

This is the first time I've used a rotating cutting mat. Wow, it's quite handy! I don't have to move the ruler or my body anymore!!! Great for half square triangles and trimming down blocks with a square. Also, my bloc-loc is always dandy! It makes perfect HSTs because it grabs the folded seam and lines up all the edges to trim them down to perfect squares (and gets rid of the dog ears). I love it! Also, I used the draw the line method for making HSTs so you can see my water soluble blue marker in the picture too. This method really saves you time.

I also wanted to mention that I am doing the Shades of Grey charm swap (from my last post) and I finally got all the fabric squares cut out and ready to mail off:

I found myself trying really hard to be exact. These will be used by others, so I could not just settle for close enough like I normally would.

Again, I am linking up at WIP Wednesdays at Freshly Pieced, and Link a Finish Fridays at Richard & Tanya Quilts.


Also, if you got this far and feel like commenting, I am currently looking for quilting ideas for quilting a quilt made entirely of hexagons. :) Right now, I am thinking of going with straight lines corner to corner, or maybe some sort design to make them pop, like just outside the ditch. Thoughts?

Until next time,
Mike.