Saturday, January 13, 2007

This & That block wise


When I joined May Britt's little challenge on these blocks I said to her that I joined at half speed if I were allowed, two blocks a month, but so far I have made 2 in 2 weeks and am really enjoying myself :-)
I have redone the purple circle on the block from the other day. It was to not round at all.
I remembered I have a set of mylar washers in a drawer, and with a washer and a light spray of fabric stiffener after gathering the fabric around the washer with a basting thread I got a circle I like.
This week's block is the purple star. I am impressed with myself for making those small dots fairly well ;-) They are 1/4", just a tad bigger than a punch hole. I am not very experienced in applique, and that is my goal for this project, to get more experienced.

How I did the small dots:
I found that I could use one of my washers as a template, drawing the inner circle of the mylar template on freezer paper - much easier for me than drawing a good mini circle by overlay. Then I ironed the freezer paper circle on the wrong side of fabric, cutting the fabric with a scant 1/4" seam allowance. Then a touch of glue stick, folding the seam allowance over. Then I iron the whole thing good, pick the freezer paper out and iron again. The mini dot is ready for applique. I found that it was easiest to use an applique needle for pinning the dot in place and use my thumb nail to hold it down as I applique it to the block.


The main reason I can give my applique blocks more attention is that my DJ swap friend and I have agreed on a break, so this is the last Christmas colour DJ block for now, half the January dose.
I found our first mails on the swapping, which dates back to March 2004. We have swapped autumn colour blocks, summer-sherbet colour blocks and last Christmas colour blocks.
We have not swapped every month through these nearly 3 years, but I have a nice collection of swap blocks to enjoy - it has been very nice.

These are most of the Christmas blocks I have made lately + a couple from my teaching material, to make a nice layout for the photo, hence the doubles.

5 comments:

  1. Anonymous5:54 pm

    Hey, my friend, slow down ! You're going to leave me behind you ! LOL
    Your colors are beautiful !
    I'm just working at them, for the moment.
    Beautiful blocks, Hanne !
    Hugs & smiles,
    NADINE.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Good Hanne, I will try to make my small dots the same way. I have three small dots on the block I am doing this evening.

    ReplyDelete
  3. You are doing such a beautiful job on your little blocks. They look like so much fun to do! One hint - if you have an art supply store anywhere close look for a plastic template with lots of different size circles cut out. They are easy to find over here but I dont' know about over there. I just figure out which one is the right size then draw them using the plastic template. Really easy that way!

    1chartfp@comcast.net

    ReplyDelete
  4. I love your blocks they are so cute can't wait to see the next blocks in the challange. Your DJ blocks look great. I like the christmas colors idea.

    Lizzy

    ReplyDelete
  5. I like the applique blocks. Will you continue the DJ ones on your own or put them aside until your and your friend are ready to begin exchanging them again?

    ReplyDelete

Thank you for visiting my blog :-)
Your lovely comments are very much appreciated.
Wishing you a wonderful day, wherever you are!