Remember this little guy? One of my favorite quilt blocks from my liberated sampler was the wonky churn dash. In my original post, I linked to a tutorial by Sarah at Sew Joy Creations, so you could make your very own liberated churn dash block.

Sarah has since developed a fantastic quilt pattern using these liberated churn dash blocks! Her pattern is 22 pages, full of color photos and very detailed. And the best part is, Sarah has offered to give away a copy of the pattern to one of you. All you need to do is leave a comment! What fabrics would you use for your Liberated Churn Dash quilt? I will pick a winner Thursday, July 19th in the evening. Good luck everyone!

++ Closing comments to pick a winner! ++

The winner is #61, Jen B! Jen said “I think I would piece together charms from swaps to “make” some fabric. Maybe my neutrals with a turquoise background.”

Congratulations Jen! I will be in contact!

Last week when I posted my Cutting Edge quilt, I mentioned that it was the first of two quilts I made for Quilt Market. Today I’m happy to share the second. This quilt was made for Ty Pennington’s booth at market using his latest fabric line from Ty Pennington Impressions.

I am having trouble finding any 2012 swatches on the Impressions website or Free Spirit/Westminster Fibers website, but you can see some the fabrics up close on the quilt photos. I chose to work with a lot of the bright colors in the line…no big surprise! This quilt was exciting to make because even non-quilty people know who Ty Pennington is, right?

Once again, Lee was nice enough to take a picture of the quilt in the booth for me at Quilt Market – thanks Lee!

This quilt is made from square blocks, but I set the inner squares and crosses on point. The blocks are 14″ squares and the full quilt measures 56″ x 56″. I quilted it with free motion meandering.

I made this quilt and my Cutting Edge quilt over a period of less than two weeks. It was exciting and stressful to be a little part of the Quilt Market rush. I also wrote a pattern for this quilt that was handed out at market and if I see it online, I will update this post with a link.

Last week I got some really exciting mail. This is the latest issue of Quiltmaker’s 100 Blocks (vol 5). It is a collection of patterns for 100 different quilt blocks, designed by various quilters/designers/bloggers. When I was flipping through the magazine, I recognized a lot of names and I’m sure you will too. So…not only am I super happy to tell you I have a block in this issue – but look, that’s my name on the cover! (Right by my good friend Lee!) In case you are wondering, that’s me, Faith Jones.

My block is called Diamond Mine and is #474 inside the magazine. They had us sign our name on the actual block which I have never done before. I kept thinking “Really? Write my name ON the block?” Despite all my elementary teachers’ best efforts, I just have horrible handwriting. You can see it in the bottom pink section.

And here is the block at my house before I mailed it off…

When I was designing the quilt block, I mocked up a couple of ways you can layout your blocks for a quilt top.

This issue of Quiltmaker’s 100 Blocks officially goes on sale May 8th. I hope you will check it out at your local bookstore or craft store!

I’m happy to have you visit my blog today as part of the Festival of Half Square Triangles! Today I’m going to share a tutorial for a new quilt block and then talk about some ideas for what you can do with it.

I almost titled this post “When a Square isn’t a Square”. Because those are the words that were constantly in my mind as I was creating this quilt block and the quilt that will follow it on Friday. When I’m designing quilts, I think I tend to fall into the mindset that I have to make blocks that are square. But when I sit down and really think about quilts that catch my eye, a lot of the time they are quilts don’t use basic squares – whether it be stars or hexies or any number of things.

So today’s block is a rectangular hexagon. This block can be used on it’s own – I actually think it would make an adorable pillow. I could see a bunch of them in different colors all over my daughter’s bed. Or it can be combined with many more blocks to make a quilt. I will share tips for making it into a quilt at the end of the block tutorial.

Let’s get started on the single block tutorial!

Step 1. Cut your fabric.

Step 2. Cut all 6 squares along the diagonal, resulting in 12 half square triangles (HST).

Step 3. Pair 8 of your HSTs together as shown. Sew together along the diagonal creating 4 squares.

Step 4. Trim your squares to 4.5″ x 4.5″.

Step 5. Sew your 4 squares together to form a pinwheel.

Step 6. Take your 4 remaining HST. Lay out as shown below.

Step 7. Sew together along the short edge, forming a larger triangle as shown below.

Step 8. Place these larger triangles on each side of your pinwheel square. Line up the middle seams and sew together.

Step 9. Using a quilting ruler, trim the sides of the resulting block if necessary, so they line up with the edges of the pinwheel section of the block.

Congratulations! You’ve made a Candy Pinwheel quilt block!

As I mentioned earlier, I think a block like this would make an adorable pillow. But what if you want a quilt? There are a few options. First, let’s talk color and layout. These blocks are staggered to “fit” together.

I followed a few color rules when designing this quilt mockup. Almost all my blocks were made using all warm (pink, red, orange, yellow) or all cool (blue, turquoise, green, purple) colors. I think this gives a bit of order to a quilt that is actually scrappy.

As for quilt top assembly, there are a couple options. First, you could make individual blocks (rectangular hexagons) and sew them together using the Y-Seam method. I’m sure most people just fainted.

But there is another easier option. If you plan your quilt ahead, you can actually sew your quilt together in rows. Simply lay out your entire quilt top on the floor or design wall, and rather than making one block at a time, you make one row at a time.

You will need some space to make your quilt this way, but I found it to be very easy. I hope that gives you some ideas for making an eye catching half square triangle quilt. I will post my finished Candy Pinwheel quilt on Friday. Here’s a sneak peek!