Starting a Winter's Lane 8 Point Star Block Quilt

At the end of August, I left work, and the kind ladies that I worked with bought me a fabulous layer cake of Winter's Lane by Kate & Birdie of Moda. I love this fabric line and last Christmas, I made a stocking out of some of the fabric. 

Source: Trixie Lixie

Rather than dive straight in, I have taken some time to work on a quilt design using the Quiltography app for ipad - this is brilliant because you can take photos of each of your fabrics, design your own block and see a mock up of the finished quilt. Then you can play around designing before cutting into your precious fabric. So, I made an 8 point star block using chevrons, squares and half square triangles.

To make the cutting out a whole lot easier, I used a chevron quilting die in my Sissix Big Shot- it is just a dream to use. Shame I didn't also have the right sized HST die, as I have had to cut all these by hand, but never mind!

Unfortunately, my first attempt at the first block failed because I didn't understand the whole Y seam issue, and so my squares also became HSTs, which meant I could use straight lines all the way without resorting needing to delve into the murky underworld of Y seams! The sewing is so ugly, I wouldn't even dare post it on here!

Then I struggled with the correct size of the HSTs because when you see it in 2D they all look like they fit together, but in real life, it just doesn't work - I had forgotten to take the seam allowances into account when working out the size. This meant a bit more liberal use of my seam ripper than I had planned for, but eventually it all clicked into place and this beautiful block was complete:

...and then I made another one, with no trouble or seam ripping necessary! So, I am going to continue with my blocks while I have a think about whether to also incorporate some sashing between the blocks and whether to keep them linear or stagger them across the quilt.

Today, I am linking up with Anything Goes Mondays over at Stitch by Stitch:

Love

Mrs Jones x