BEE-UTIFUL STACKED WINDMILLS

Tricky Business....

This block is fast becoming a favourite in the Quilting Bee community, so far it is the most popular block to be chosen in both of my current Quilting Bees, bringing my total made to 4!! I do love making this block and each time seeing the differences that fabric choices and placements can make.

First up was "Radiant Orchid", Pantone's colour of the year and Rachel's colour choice of the month, the rest was completely up to our own imagination and creativity....pink, grey and floral what's not to love??

I had a few hiccups with the centre of this one, trying to get those blessed points to match up, hence the unpicked stitches....grrrrrrrrr

But I got there in the end. So feeling confident and some what pleased with myself I thought well why not crack on with the other one?? If I had known how much this second one was going to misbehave I would have invested in a good bottle (or 3) of Rose before I started. 

The recipient of this block sent across her own instructions and asked that we use those instead of the book, she sent very clear links to various websites, which were easy to navigate, but for some reason I just could not get on with this one.

A square within a square...simple enough concept, cut a big square, cut four smaller squares, sew them in the corners cut off the excess leaving 1/4 seam allowance. I could get this far then all sense appeared to leave me....

I managed to do this 3 times!!!! Before sense found me again

A multitude of half square triangles, colourful language, blue smoke and wasted fabric later things were starting to take shape

I played around with a couple of colours for the 'center ring', originally I had florals but it was just to much, a darker blue really changed the whole look of the block and wasn't what Isobel was after so in the end I decided on the very pale green with a subtle leaf design. This is the end result an English Summer Garden for a very worthy cause, the intended friend this quilt is going to recently lost her husband to tragic circumstance, hopefully this quilt that Isobel is putting together will go a little way to making her feel better.

Something else I really enjoy about creating the same block is fabric choice and placements, in both blocks I used Robert Kaufman Modern Bliss in grey you can buy yours here, it really is such a great fabric to work with and so very versatile as well. It lifted up the pale florals in the English Garden block, yet made the bright pink pop in Radiant Orchid! You may have noticed that I have also been using it in some of the blocks I have done for the Nautical Quilt.

As always we love to hear from you, please leave us comments or email us with your thoughts, feedback and guidance.

Happy Quilting

Kerry xx