Lucy Boston Milestone

Since August of 2019 I have been working on sewing the sashing around all 56 of my Lucy Boston Patchwork of the Crosses quilt blocks. My Instagram feed has been an interrupted parade of blocks with their new grey perimeters, each one counting up to the finish.

Block 32 of 56, finished Apr 15, 2020

Block 35 of 56, finished Apr 27, 2020

Block 44 of 56, finished Sep 6, 2020

And finally on Sunday, the last one!

Block 56 of 56, finished Feb 7, 2021

At some point I shared the concern that I might get bored of sewing (seemingly) endless grey honeycombs, but really, I didn't. I enjoy the stitching and it was a lot less taxing than when I had to match the fabrics in the blocks! Each block didn't take too, too long so I had regular injections of feeling like I had finished something.

You would think using solid grey would preclude any drama, but I managed. When I bought the grey fabrics, I was planning to use different shades from white to dark grey. After I bought them, I decided the white wasn't going to work and changed my plan. Last April, I pulled out the fabrics to compare what I needed with this new plan to what I had.

You can see the fabric I labeled "3" just has a couple strips left; it was not enough.

Glad that I kept everything organized and labeled, I knew exactly what to order. I made a trip to the store where I got it on the off chance I would get fabric from the same bolt, and they didn't have it any more. Being my last option, I ordered some online and just hoped it would match what I had. Dye lots in yarn is a real thing (as in different batches of the same colourway won't be the same) and I thought that might be true of fabric too. When I got it, I tucked it away because I wasn't in a cutting mood and had plenty of other blocks to sew.

At the end of the year, I got through sewing all the other blocks and finally needed to cut strips from grey 3. But I couldn't find the extra that I had bought earlier in the year. I searched through my maker space and the boxes of my fabric multiple times and could not find it. I finally decided it wasn't worth my time to keep looking and ordered more. Even further removed in time from the original purchase; even more chance of the dye lot not matching.

I received the new fabric and promptly cut it into strips, cut out the honeycomb shapes and glued the 138 honeycombs I needed to finish. I pulled out the block that was waiting to be finished and set the first honeycomb in place:

It didn't match!!

I was so disappointed. And wondering why I didn't check before I cut and glued all those honeycombs when I was already worried the colours wouldn't match!

When I was ready to face it, I tried to find a solution. With some research, a few different things made me suspicious that I mixed up the names. One of them being that fabric I couldn't "find" from April, but funny enough, at the same time I had more of grey 2 than I thought I should!

Now, having an idea of what the grey I needed was called (I suspected I had mixed up the names of grey 2 and 3 but couldn't be sure), I took samples of the fabric to a different quilt store. I don't normally shop there because it's far away, but I was in that city for something else and made the stop.

The shop doesn't have a particularly large section of solids, and they only had five greys. And only one of them was from the manufacturer I needed. And. It. Was. The. Colour. I. Needed!

These colours match!

I was very happy about that, let me tell you. I could have tried an online order, but finding it in person and being sure was so much better!

After that it was simple work to cut and glue another 138 honeycombs for the remainder of my blocks.

Here's a pic of all of the blocks hung together:

You might notice I have also started to sew some of the black connecting pieces between the blocks. And I have started some of the crosses too:

All the centers come from the same fabric, but there are different circle designs.

I'm using three different fabrics for the arms of the crosses, the three bottom ones in this picture:

The top one might be used in the final border.

In a couple places, I have sewn blocks together to get a feel for that:

The lower horizontal seam is sewn

The upper horizontal seam is sewn

I'm still not sure if I'm going to sew it all together in rows first, which is what I see other PotC makers doing online, or try to sew it into sections. Or maybe spiral out from the center.

For now, I'm sewing crosses, which go really fast compared to sashing a block (16" of seams to sew instead of 64"!) and considering how to finish the outside edge. The quilt is visible from where I sit and stitch, so it's easy to stare at it and ponder my options.

Finished...and Not Half Way There

Let's not bury the headline: I have finished all 56 Lucy Boston blocks!!

I started to put the first blocks together on January 20, 2018 and cut the thread on the last block on March 10, 2019.

Following are the final nine blocks. I'll start with the ones that came out of the Third Block contest by Alewives Fabrics. The first one I entered, what I call the pineapple block:

Then we have the tile block, which is my favourite (of these ones):

This is mostly the winning block:

I moved the semi-circle pieces to the corners and switched out the flower pieces for the green furl pieces.

And the last of this set:

I added the tigers after the challenge. I love them - hiding in the flowers.

When my mom took a trip to Pennsylvania she picked up this Normal Rockwell fabric.

By then she knew what size I needed for the motifs and that I only needed a quarter yard. (It's so easy to buy a quarter yard!)

I had fun putting together this bright pink and yellow (and orange) block:

You'll see some of the same fabric in this yellow and blue blend block:

I had some of the pieces for the following block for quite a while.

The fabric with the green lined curly pieces was very limited and I couldn't get enough pieces for a lot of designs. I had several ideas of what to do on the other diagonal but nothing worked. I finally found some fabrics to put together a dark purple "background".

And finally, the mask block:

It took a long time to find eyes for this block. I tried a lot of fabrics with circles and ovals and kept my eyes out for fabrics in the stores for months...and found nothing. I finally tried a lot of the pieces that I had prepared for other blocks but rejected and these ones worked for me.

Sunday I was at church for the afternoon so I took advantage of the large table space and worked on the layout.

I had worked on it once before and didn't land on anything. I tried sorting by colour again and just couldn't work it out (again). I ended up ordering the blocks from most traditional to most unconventional.

Once the blocks were in order, I marked each block's placement on the back.

It's not every quilt block that you can just write on the back! :)

Now it's time to think about sashing. My experience in explaining the sashing is that people don't get it. (Or if they get it once, they've forgotten by the next time we talk about it.) So I have produced pictures!

Here's the basic block:

Around that block, I will sew more of the honeycombs (shown in grey) to make a sort of sashing:

But since the block is not straight on the sides, when the blocks come together, you have these extra square and cross shapes (shown in blue):

Most of the quilts I've seen have a pale colour for the sashing and then brighter or darker fabric for the squares and crosses. Usually the little squares are the same fabric, the center four squares of the cross are fussy cut to make a kaleidescope effect, and the outside squares of the cross are the same colour.

I have been thinking of grey for the sashing for quite a while. There's enough colour in the blocks, a plain solid border would be good. Here's a mock up:

I just put in black for the little squares and crosses because I'm not sure what I'm doing with them and I knew black would show up.

Soon after deciding on grey, I wondered about choosing different shades so that I could build a gradient.

One concern is that the more complicated the sashing, the more it would distract from the blocks. But I think this gradient effect would be noticed and effective from far away (across a room) but not nearly so obvious when you were close up looking at the blocks. Then you would only really see the fabric right around the block.

In the example above, each block is surrounded by the same fabric. My next thought was what if the colour changes didn't line up with the blocks? Something like this:

I have to decide before I can go any further. (Decide, and find fabric in the right shades of grey.)

Back to the title of this post...each block has 24 pieces. The sashing around the block is 24 pieces. So there is just as much sewing in the sashing as the blocks. And then you I have to sew the squares and crosses too. So I'm not quite half way. But certainly the hard part is done. Once I decide which way to go I can make the pieces in bulk and just sew sew sew.

Since I'm not sure which way to go on the squares and crosses, I plan to just sash the blocks and not worry about putting them together yet. The only sad part about moving forward is that my blocks will no longer fit in my binder. I've gotten attached to my binder of blocks!

Sashing Through the Snow

I know I still have two more blocks to show you from my Farm Girl Vintage quilt (and yes, I'll get to it; I'll get to it). In the meantime, I have been looking ahead to the next step--sashing and putting the blocks together.

With some calculations about what it would take (I was surprised it was more than 3 yards), I realized I didn't have enough of any one fabric for all of the sashing. So, first good chance I had, I was off to the fabric store! :)

I pulled out fabrics I thought would work and then spread them out on a table in the classroom to audition blocks on them.

Some options included a classic red with white polka dots.

A soft blue with larger white polka dots.

A small print on black. Not very traditional but I thought that the blocks might really pop.

A pale orange...not a colour I really thought would click but I wanted to try something unexpected in case it worked.

I was really tempted by this busy brown print. I know it's not the prettiest option but I somehow thought it was closer to what would be available at the time. It felt more "authentic" to the 30s repro prints in this quilt.

A darker blue with the white polka dots.

And a similar blue with the smaller polka dots. Obviously I had a thing for polka dots!

After multiple comparisons, I narrowed it to two finalists: the busy brown and the darker blue with medium polka dots in white:

I made my choice, added a completely different fabric for an outer border and made my purchases.

I couldn't start cutting or sewing right away because I had to determine a layout and I had to decide how I was going to do the sashing. I like to add a strip to one side and the bottom of each block but this wouldn't help me hide the fact that my blocks vary in size by 1/2". Instead, I planned to sew a narrower strip on all four sides of each block, which would then form the right width sashing when I sewed two blocks together. (Got all that? Don't worry if you don't!)

First step is the layout:

I had to know where the blocks were going because the strips on the outside edges had to be the full width of the sashing. I laid the sashing fabric on the spare bed and arranged (and rearranged) the blocks. Yes, I know, I know...you're all happy I picked the blue sashing. Me too! :)

Once I had the layout, I did all of the calculations for how many strips I would need and what sizes they would need to be. I ended up having to cut 176 strips with 5 different dimensions.

A few of my many, many cut strips!

Then I pulled the blocks off the bed in groups that were sashed the same (such as corner, left side, bottom, etc). I added the correct sashing strip to all four sides and moved on to the next set.

Instead of the most common way to border a block (sewing strips on opposite sides and then sewing strips on the remaining two sides), I decided to sew on the strips rotating around the block. This way the sashing didn't dictate a vertical or horizontal vibe to the quilt and all the blocks would be the same.

Here's how I did it in this quilt:

Start with a bare block.

Place the first strip on the block, matching one end of the strip to the edge of the block. You then have to start sewing in the middle of the edge somewhere and sew a partial seam. You can't start sewing at the start of the seam.

And you get something like this. You may note that the top edges are not exactly aligned. I "overshot" the edge on purpose and then cut it even with the block edge after it was sewn. It's much more accurate than trying to match up the raw edges. (It shouldn't work that way, but it does.)

Then, since the lined up edges were on top, you rotate the block clockwise and add a sashing strip to the edge of the block and the edge of the first sashing strip. You can sew the whole seam this time.

 This is the result.

Rotate the block in the same direction and add the third strip, same as the second.

Three sides done, one to go!

Rotate the block one more time in the same direction and add the fourth sashing piece. I went ahead and pinned back the loose part of the first sashing strip to make sure it wouldn't get caught in the seam.

And now it looks like we're done.

But of course we're not, because the first strip is still only half sewn!

But now that the fourth strip is in place, we can flip the first strip so it is right-sides-together with the block and sew the remainder of the seam.

And now we're done!

So far, I have finished all four corners, the four 12" blocks (which needed yet another size of sashing strips), and all of the outside pieces. (Hmm...it almost sounds like I'm putting together a puzzle!) All of the blocks on the outer edge needed thicker strips on one or two sides. By only working on blocks that were oriented in the same way and by adding the wide strips first, I was able to keep track of what I was doing.

Now I have only 14 interior blocks to go and they have the same four pieces on all four sides. I'll just have to continue to make sure that I rotate the sashing in the same way and that they get back into the layout right-side-up (as in not up-side-down).

After that they will all get a good pressing and then be cut to size. I made sure the sashing was sized for the smallest square and that means I'll have to cut most of the blocks down--the price to pay for being able to assembly-line sew this step. It also means I'll be able to make sure each block is centered in its section no matter what size it is.

Also, I have one more surprise in the setting of this quilt that this method of sashing allows for! :)