"It takes ages to finish a quilt you're not working on!"

Monday, July 18, 2011

Pinwheel Block

The fourth Sampler in Leila's Skills Builder online course is the Pinwheel design. It can be in two colours, or a mixture. I was going to go for a mixture, but decided it would be quicker to just have one colour with white. I haven't been buying any new fabric for this course; it seems silly to buy more when I can just use what is in my mish mash stash of fabrics. The problem is that they are not all 100% cotton - some are not cotton at all! I've picked them up at opshops, Guild remnant bins, and so on.
The white fabric I used to make this block is a mystery to me. I don't think it is cotton because the weave is very wide (is that the right word) and it frays very easily. But I have a heap of it, so I figured I may as well use it. Not a good idea! But I got there in the end. The blue floral fabric was definitely cotton and much easier to worth. Ah well, as I've said before, it is all a learning process. You may notice in the photo that I machined a zig zag edge around the block - this is to stop it fraying any more. My white squares blocks ended up being a bit smaller than the pinwheels because threads kept peeling off the edge every time I handled them!
All in all, I'm rather pleased with my first Pinwheel effort. Oh I know the corners and things don't match perfectly, but it only took me one afternoon to make it from start to finish, and it was fun. Mind you, I don't know that I would care to make a whole quilt out of Pinwheel blocks - that would be asking too much, even if I used the correct cotton fabric!

3 comments:

Jane said...

It's not my favourite block to do, it's all the trimming. Seems to take forever. They do make for stunning patterns though

Annie said...

Looks really pretty - mish-mash of fabrics and whatever imperfections only you would be able to notice. Great idea to use up these stray pieces for learning experiences.

artymess said...

pretty block Gina.....x