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City Sampler Sew Along: Blocks 4, 5, 6

Sew Sweetness

This post is part of the City Sampler Sew Along.

For more information or to see blocks completed so far, click here!

Kim – Hey y’all!!!!  So excited to be part of the Tula Pink City Sampler QAL!  I feel in love with Tula’s quilt when I saw it at Quiltcon and was such a goof, I did not realize it was going to be a book!  So when Sara was telling me about it I begged and pleaded for her to let me play to.  Okay…maybe no begging but she did say YES!

This week we are doing blocks 4, 5 and 6.  I have been seeing lots of people getting caught up into these beauties and are on block TWELVE ( Katherine)!  They are very easy to complete and so that instant gratification is definitely there!

For my blocks, I have chosen a new line made by Pat Sloan called Bobbins and Bits.  The colors are fantastic and there is a challenge for me in this collection.  The “B” word and I am not talking budget ( I hate that word, especially when it has fabric in front of it).  The word is batik.  I have never used batiks.  I never see people in my sewing groups using batiks and I am not sure that I had ever even seen a batik fabric up close…until now.  I asked Pat if I could use her collection and she asked ” All of them?”  I said “YES!”  So here I am with batiks…in a modern quilt… and I am excited!!!!!

I have a very short list of what I will wash before sewing.  I will wash ALL flannel and anything RED!  I am now adding batiks to that list.  They have a different dying process and the fabric itself has a different feel to it.  Not bad just different, kinda grown up man’s freshly heavy starched shirt feel.  I am also ironing all of my fabrics for this project with starch.  With all the smaller pieces I find it helps to keep everything where it should be…like a good foundation garment ;o)

I am using Aurifil 50wt thread.  I have the same cone that has been on my machine for months and has traveled to see Laurie Tigner to quilt two quilts and it still has more thread than I think I can ever use,LOL! The 50wt is so thin it helps everything stay nice and flat! Gotta love that!

I selected from my fabrics a collection of colors for those three blocks, for every group of three there will be the same color scheme. I figure that will give me a nice variety to play with when I have completed all 100!!!!

When I was cutting, I did not want to lose small pieces so I clipped them to the page when cutting the next group.  This girl needs all the help she can get!

I also found that when sewing the smaller pieces together there were some slight differences in the sizes, so I pinned the ends and let the bulkier side or the side with the most fabric be on the underside.

When I sew, I make sure this side is facing down and the feed dogs help straighten the “issues” all out…GOOD DOGS!

Block 4

Block 5

Block 6

Hope you are all enjoying this as much as I am!!!!

and a BIG SHOUT OUT to my cousin Karen…she is making her FIRST EVER pieced quilt and I am SUPER HAPPY for her!!!!! GOOOOOOOOOOO KAREN!!!!!

-Kim
My Go-Go Life

Gina – Hey there! Block #4 was a lot of fun to sew together even though it may have taken me twice as long as the rest so far. I am kind of obsessed with this light violet purple color and I couldn’t help but use the same fussy cut Parisville ship that Tula uses in the book. I actually cheated a little bit and used 4 prints instead of 5 by fussy cutting the same loopy print up in 2 different spots to get the color I wanted. Tula mentions at the beginning of her book that she intentionally named the blocks with numbers only so that we could infuse our own meaning into them. I named this one my Stormy Seablock, but mostly my blocks’ main meaning has been “favorites”. Even though we are only 4 blocks in I will declare this my current favorite and would love to stop everything and make a quilt using these colors only right now, but Block #5-100 await.
 

Block 4

 
 

Block 5

Block #5 is my Bee Block. It is actually a Prince Charming hex box and The Birds & the Bees, but they go so perfectly together!  I just got stung by a wasp on my hand moving some patio furniture around this
week so it is only fitting I sew a badge of honor for running like the wind within seconds and only crying 1 tear. The fabrics I chose were definitely darker than the book, but I know once I am laying all of my
blocks out it will either be perfect or I can move it to another spot. The Echino linen solid I used with it may be the darkest yellow I use in the quilt. I am not completely opposed to repeating fabric within
the quilt, but I have been trying to find the perfect fabric for the perfect shade which means for the most part each fabric will only be used once in the quilt.

 

Block 6

 
Block #6; I don’t know whether the woodgrain or the gingham came first, but they had to be used together and it was immediately named the Picnic Block. Ladybugs are totally welcome at my picnics any time! It
was nice how quickly this 12 piece block came together compared to the 21 piece block earlier. It seems like only choosing 3 fabrics that match is a lot quicker than 5 too. I spent the extra time I had this week picking out fabric for future blocks. I still haven’t found a suitable bin for keeping my finished blocks in so I would love for you to share photos in the Flickr group of how you are staying organized. Thanks to everyone who has been posting pictures of their finished blocks. It is amazing to see the variety!

-Gina
Gina Pina 

Sara – I am so excited to be moving along and getting some more of a variety of color in my blocks (my first set of blocks were blue and pink)!

Block 5

Block 5 was one of the easiest in the first section of the book. It’s funny but while I was assembling this, I felt okay with the colors I had chosen for this orange block, but after seeing the photos, I wish that the ‘background’ fabric had been a different shade. It doesn’t stand out as much as I’d like.

Here’s a little tip…when I made the orange block, I drew a horizontal line across those long vertical strips in the middle, so I could line up the left-half of the block. In the photo above, I’ve moved my ruler down just a little bit, so you can see what part of the block that I am marking with my pen.
Clearly I did not take my own advice when I made Block 6, the yellow block. It looks a little wonky. But I know that, as 6″ blocks, no one is going to be able to tell in my finished quilt. So I’m just going to leave this one be.
Block 6

And here are my first 6 blocks! If you have a little set of blocks assembled already, doesn’t it make you super excited to start to see a formation going already?!

Blocks 1-6

 -Sara
Sew Sweetness

So, if you are sewing along at home, be sure to link up ONLY blocks 4, 5, and 6 in this post (you will have time to link up your other blocks in future posts). Please link up separately for each block. As a reminder, you can link to your blog post, Flickr, or wherever else you are hosting your pictures. You must link up here on this post in order to be eligible for the monthy prize, to be awarded on June 30th!

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8 thoughts on “City Sampler Sew Along: Blocks 4, 5, 6

  1. margaret says:

    how good it is to see the blocks others have made, I have done the first 6 but do not know how to put them on this web page, can you advise please.

    1. right under the block photos above it says “click here to enter” – click there – it takes you to a page to fill out – the top line is where you paste your link – that is the address line at the top of the page with your photograph on it – copy that address, then paste it into that first line on the “entry” page…take a stab at that and see if that doesn’t help you figure it out…

  2. DeeAnn says:

    Beautiful blocks everyone! It is so much fun to see what everyone else is doing.

  3. Lisa C says:

    Kim, I never prewash my fabrics (I don’t use flannel) even my batiks. Is there a reason you do? I realize you said the fabric dying process is different but I meant did the store owner/designer/manufacturer recommend it? You are right — the feel of batiks is different and I ended up buying special needles to do the hand-binding. I have found that some batiks are easy to slide a needle through and some are horrible.

  4. kateuk says:

    Sara- I got how to do the link thing, just the first photo is the wrong one…other three are correct. oops and apologies.
    Lisa- I once did some embroidery using thick perle cotton and some particularly stiff batiks-ended up with holes in my fingers!Some aren’t so bad, but these ones were a nightmare!

  5. Hi Sara, so sorry I posted my block 2 on the 4-6 thread, I’ve correctly put it in 1-3 but you may want to delete entry 136 as it would be a duplicate – I’m so sorry! I’m new to Linky too! I’ll do better in weeks to follow, promise! Loving the QAL, it’s my first one and it is SO much fun!

  6. Mere says:

    I misnumbered my Block 4 as Block 6 (entry #16) and couldn’t figure out how to fix it–sorry about that! I am loving making these blocks and seeing all of the other beautiful creations!! Thank you so much for hosting!

  7. Cloud CouCou says:

    Loving this sew along, thanks very much! Just catching up with my blocks, but getting there slowly!

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