Drafting CQ Blocks

I've had these sweet vintage Valentine images with birds on them for a while and have long wanted to do something with them.  When I saw a Vintage Valentine Round Robin on CQI, I signed up right away.  But the round robins usually consist of 6 blocks and I only had 5 images, so I decided to do this one on my own in my favorite muted soft colors.  I found a fun assortment of other images for the round robin, which I'll put together soon.

As is the case for many people, I struggle with piecing.  Usually, I just do a sew and flip method, building from the center out, but it seems that I waste a lot of fabric sometimes. And it takes seemingly forever.  Then I'm not always happy with the result, though I've often realized that this is a good excuse to let one's creativity have free reign in order to overcome!  But for this project, my silk stash consists of mostly small pieces, and I wanted to make the best use of them in order to have enough for all 5 blocks.  So, after rereading Allie's book, perusing Gerry's blog as well as those of Vintage Vogue, Kitty Stevens, Sharon Boggen and others, I decided to design a couple of block patterns to use.  I wanted one where the image tilted left and one to the right.


I started off using my Omnigrip square ruler to draw the 6 inch blocks, making sure to allow an extra 1/4" all the way around for seam allowance.  I also played with some thumbnail sketches to come up with ideas for piecing.


Then with a ruler and the centers marked, I drew the pieces and made some notes for seam allowance. I also numbered the pieces in the order in which they'll be attached to help keep me organized.  You'll notice that they are basically the same block mirrored, with just a couple of minor differences in the angle of some seams.


Here I was trying out the images on the squares.


Because these are square images, I can rotate the blocks and still get the tilt I need.  The blocks look wonderfully varied using this technique!

Next I 2 copies each of the drafted blocks and cut patterns from them.  I laid each block out as I cut it out so I could check for color placement.  I was thrilled at how little waste I had with the silk!  Tomorrow, I hope to get the blocks stitched up!