Hive 9 March Tutorial

Hello all, this is Shauna of Shauna’s World (aka @tomosia) and I’m so excited to be the queen of Hive 9 this month. A little about me, I live just north of Dallas, TX with my sister, nephew and 2 dogs. We are a bit of a menagerie, but it works for us. My sister and I have are both quilters, so we have lots of fun bouncing ideas off of each other.

This is my third year of participating in Stash Bee and I have thoroughly enjoyed it. For me the absolutely hardest part is picking out the block I want ya’ll to make for me. I started looking in January for what block I would pick and I found what I wanted almost immediately. Last year Lanakila did this block for her turn as queen in April.

I love the block, but I want something a little different in coloring. I love low volume fabrics, and have a fairly large stash of them that I’ve used on a couple of other quilts. So I decided that the background fabrics would be low volume and the stars would be bright Pink or Purple.  I did a mock-up of the quilt in EQ and really loved how it looked.

So first let’s look at my fabric pull. First is the low volume fabrics. I really want it to be very scrappy, so please use as many different low volume fabrics as possible and I don't mind a few solids, but I really want to limit them. The fabrics can be white or cream, tone on tone or prints, just so long as they read as low volume. I had a hard time photographing the white on white prints, they look like solids, but they aren’t.

For the stars, I want bright pinks or purples. I think tone on tone or very small prints work best here because I want the star to really pop against the backgrounds. Please avoid pastels, because they blend in too easily and I would prefer no batiks. Here are some I pulled from my stash.

You will need to cut the following

Background – low volume

15 – 4” x 4” squares

Star – Bright Pink/Purple

1 – 4” x 4”

8 – 2.5” x 2.5”

Since I want a larger quilt, I know I’m going to have to make several of these blocks, so I just cut a bunch of the 4 x 4 low volume fabrics and then laid them out in groups until I was happy. I love the look of all the different fabrics, and I tried to mix different shades/prints to give it a very scrappy look. I found it easiest to layout all of the block out so I could pick which ones would surround the star. This shows the white on white fabrics a little better.

To assemble the block, you will need to create the points for the star first. You need to snowball two corners on each side of four of the low volume blocks. This is the easiest way I’ve found to do them. I didn't take many pictures during this part, so if you have any questions, don't hesitate to reach out to me.

1. Mark each of the 2 ½” squares diagonally down the center. 
2. Place one 2 ½” square on each 4" square, and stitch along the marked diagonal.
3. Trim the seam allowance to 1/4" and press towards the larger block.
4. Place a second 2 ½” square on each 4" square on the other corner of the same side and stitch along the marked diagonal.
5. Trim the seam allowance to 1/4" and press towards the corner.

Here is Lanakila's tutorial as well...April 2016 Hive 2

Lay out the block and assemble. 

I prefer ironing my seams to the side so I ironed rows one and three to the right and two and four to the right. But it doesn’t really matter a lot because I plan on putting sashing between the blocks so there won’t be matching seams. The block should measure 14 1/2" square when you are done.  Here are the three blocks I made as practice. I really had a hard time with the white on white fabrics, but at least you get the general idea.

This block is really easy to make, the hardest part for me was picking out the low volume fabrics. I can't wait to see what you create!!! If you have any questions don't hesitate to ask. I hope you have as much fun making my blocks as I have making your blocks.