March BeeSewcial: Repeated Triangles in Blue

For our April blocks Marci asked us to keep it simple, play and have fun.  She did a great job outlining the challenge - a task I find very challenging. Read about it here: Time To Play .  

When she said to not overthink it I kind of chuckled and wondered if that part was written for me. The only picky thing was to make them 12.5" or 6.5" square which doesn't sound that unusual but I have become accustom to having little or no size restraint with this group.

BeeSewcial April blocks

Having the palette open to all shades of blue was fantastic.  They deserved a glamour shot so I stuck them to a wire fence - yes with blue painters tape. 

Block One 12.5" square

For the first block I used my go to ocean blues leaning towards aquas and included one strategically placed black accent.   Negative space was consciously reserved.   The design was based on this QDAD (quilt design a day)

QDAD design

The stacking element and angles are a pretty direct interpretation. This was created to be a quilt rather than block and I think they would each work well for both.   Our beemate Stephanie scaled her 12" block up to 96", gasp.

Process 

The construction of the triangles tossed around in my head for weeks. Because there are so many different ways to get the same end result and I'm all about the process- I chose a method that I had enjoyed while sewing my OIB quilt (Old Italian Block) and missed doing. Anita Grossman Solomon'sbook and crafsty class are clever.

OIB Process Picture

Look!! I even took the time to estimate my target size and sketched which was a huge "extra" step for me.

Quilt math-ish

Of course I deviated from the plan but that's to be expected. The lower left is another idea I had for block two that I rather like and didn't materialize.    Instead - this happened:

Block Two 12.5" square

Sometimes when I work into the wee hours I get a second wind and the creative juices flow.  It's also a zone that tends towards the more abstract than focused.  I was relieved that Marci gave it the thumbs up and felt the partial repeats followed her outline. 

Experimenting with a Strip Set

Experimenting with "what ifs" is encouraged by this group.  The variety of blue for block two is more along the denim family - a nod to my February challenge.  I made a strip set from a  kona jelly roll and added slivers from trimming I'd kept.  

 

The goal was to have repetition without boring me silly and I wanted to try out my new bloc-loc ruler.  I'd have to score my trial as a fail for this project at least since I spent most of my energy redoing the random selections created to get the parts I wanted. 

Building Out

Building out to the target size and maximizing the shapes to fool the eye in the areas that were less obviously triangles took some fiddling.   That part of the process is fun, having things finally fall into place even when it takes a bit of pushing. 

It's a guy thing

I'll end with a couple more scenic shots.   Marci is making a quilt for her hubby - ssshhh, don't tell mine, he'll wonder why he's not getting one!  

Barely Breazy