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Whirlybird is block 23 designed by Laura Muir. It's a very unique looking block, a windmill, a pinwheel, and arrows spinning block! So much is happening in a small area but it's so fun! I love the movement in it and how different it looks in the color studies. The darker colors seem to create more depth and space with parts of the background creating more 3D layers. The very first block looks almost minimalist in comparison.  This Whirlybird block can be made to look quite layered. Depending on the color placement in this block, the illusion can consist of a background snowball square with a large x over it, a smaller x over that and then a pinwheel at the forefront. Quite intricate with a lot of movement in one square however big or small.  The block is still bright and bold with a calming center block. I've chosen to use fewer but bright colors in the Popsicle palette. The center has a contrast color, here it's Thatched in Grapefruit.  The white background in Thatched Blizzard makes these brighter colors standout.  The section of the quilt where the Whirlybird I set is made of Dotty Thatched in Turquoise, Lime, and Indigo. The regular Thatched colors are Navy, Grass, Mist, Grapefruit and small stitch-n-flip corners in Cornflower.    Just like last week, the difference between the Popsicle and the Snuggly palette is big! The snuggly palette is much calmer and softer but the center pinwheel is a bold contrast to the calm block.  These natural tones create a foundation against the bold Fuchsia. Such a pleasant combination of colors. This is the Whirlybird block set into the upper left section of the quilt layout.   This weeks block was the last one for my layout. I can devote my efforts fully to assembly, as you know I got a head start already! Happy sewing!
Block 19 is here, and it's bringing the love! Wholehearted is designed by Jackie MacDonald and it is ready to steal your heart. There's just something extra special about a heart block, this is no exception.  Dotty Thatched in Tangerine and Thatched in Petal compliment each other like a perfect pair. This duo gives the Wholehearted block its movement. Talk about sew in love!  This heart block is all about the classics, constructed entirely from half square triangles and of course the four corner blocks. Wholehearted proves that simple shapes can lead to lovely results and a great block for practicing and perfecting technique. So how about a little color play on this block and lets see what we get!  I completely stayed with the heart this week for my sewn version of the block. But we can see other shapes evolve when we incorporate colors into the corners and segment the color families into bands. High contrast of black and white emphasizes those sharp corners of triangles and can make a line of a saw blade or very abstract shapes. With orange, pinkish and purple colors joining the black and white, it is a graphic bold statement.  Here are separations of the blocks in black and white as well. But back to sewn ones...  The Thatched Snuggly palette is bursting with color, it's proof that softness and vibrance can absolutely go hand in hand. This two tone block is subtle, yet it packs a punch. Soft, sweet and totally striking!  Happy sewing, Friends!
Camille Roskelley designed this weeks block and named it Carousel Waltz. For this block you don't need to squint your eyes to see it's already waltzing carousel-style! Colorstudy play makes simple fan blades, a small pinwheel within the center, emphasizing the plus shape, more focus on the diamond background, making it look 3d with shading and a mirrored reflection of... perhaps a sewing needle? The ones with little pinwheels in the center remind me of a bow on the top of a box.   greyscale to imagine your own colors...  For the Popsicle block I'm working with the blue and green colors, mixing regular Thatched and Dotty Thatched. The light blue corners gives more depth to this block.  It's an interesting block having the pinwheel blades extend to the edge.  The Snuggly colorway is much more pronounced with the dark mocha brown blades. The colorway itself is much softer but this is a good example of the power of color.  My Carousel Walz is living on the upper left and lower right outer sides. I love seeing how this fills in!  Happy sewing my fellow Blockheads!
Corey Yoder is bringing us Flight Path this week! A clever variation of the Dutchmans Puzzle block keeping with traditions but still making it fresh and new.  For this weeks color studies I wanted to bring out the look of a more cohesive block trying to define it in color, letting color dictate where the eye goes not the seams. Middle row, left block looks almost artsy like an abstract composition where the bottom left is more traditional with a plus sign (if you squint your eyes) within the more traditional block. The bottom right block has a "supergraphic" look to it. Doesn't this blend of colors make you think of sorbet?  The grayscale option gives a much more defined visual expression. A moodier look to the block. But this is also a guide to using your own color palette as this defines the light and dark perfectly. Assign a color-hue to an equal shade of gray - light to light, medium to medium, and dark to dark - the overall look will show up as the block chosen.  First up is my Popsicle palette. I'm using these two identical blocks in different ways. The placements in the quilt defines the colorway making one a blender or border block for seamless transition from one color of the quilt to the other.  The blue green block made with three of the new Dotty Thatched colors from the new collection available now! The mixing of Dotty Thatched and regular Thatched gives such movement.  And then there is the Snuggly palette - a much calmer and warmer feel. The neutral block is made up of four different shades of Thatched browns - Washed Linen, Oatmeal, Cocoa and Mocha.  The fuchsia block is my border block making the transition from one colorway to the next look intentional. How different the two backgrounds of both colorways are! Quite striking and such a fun play on color.   The middle rows of the stars including the center star have been completed. I have added squares and rectangles to the middle row blocks.
That's all for this week. Happy quilting, quilters! Robin Janet Clare brings us a lovely lovely block this week with "What a Lark!" There is so much fun to have with this block, treating the center as arrows or a plus sign. I also like how we can line up colors within the half square triangles to let them be little triangles or form into bands of color. The bottom center and right show how those lines can be in gradations of color to almost look like the center is radiating light or it is a supergraphic.  I also think it is interesting to see how those corners can change looks when I see the right one on the top row. I notice the elements of the squares more prominently  Here is our black and white, with and without lines.  This week the sewn blocks really have more difference between the two palettes. The popsicle one is springy and fresh with Dotty Thatched in Lime. I love that fizzy look of the dots and how the green looks with a variety of blues. A little pop of orange is a fun accent.   Here is the popsicle palette plan so far! My blocks are planned for the upper left corner and lower right side.  The snuggly palette is soothing and warm with Buttermilk Thatched background. I kept these blocks simpler with fewer colors.   That top corner felt ignored before! Now it's starting to get some action.  Melina made 4 blocks for this week. We still go back and forth each week on what color palette we prefer! I can't wait to see how this looks at the end. But for now, keep sewing!! Happy summer and hope you are staying cool.
Barb Groves is our designer this week with her "Polaris" block. Use the triangle backgrounds as stripes, accent colors or a band running through the block. Thanks for this simple, sweet block this week Barb!   It is nice to have a block without so many pieces this week!   I've got two blocks in my quilt this week for both the popsicle and snuggly palettes! My blocks are in the lower right and also the split color middle between the top two sides.   Loving those warm and snuggly colors!   Hope you are all staying cool and safe and are having a good summer. Keep on sewing and posting! Happy Blockheads!
Sherri McConnell brings us "Sandcastle" quilt block this week for Moda Blockheads. Quarter square triangles are a big part of this week's block and the little stitch-and-flip corners add a lovely little accent area. When my colors are side by side to visually extend a shape, you see squares on point or arrow heads or rows of diamonds. I like how the small triangles in the first two in the middle row look like little ears, or on the bottom row, when it looks like the tops of cats heads on the last two.  Gray scale for easier envisioning with other colors:  And with the lines for ease of seeing the actual pieces:  My sewn up blocks look fairly similar this week between the two palettes. The main difference is in the white vs buttermilk background and ruby vs cranberry in the middles.   My Sandcastle blocks will go in the upper right corner and in the lower left row of the quilt body. In the Popsicle palette it looks like this:  Here is the Snuggly palette:   We are two months in to our sew along! I hope you are having fun with the blocks and are sharing your progress in the facebook group. Happy sewing!
Good morning! Another day of Moda Blockheads and today we have Bellissimo Star from Joanna Figueroa of Fig Tree and Co.  It is another 18" block this week. Ribbon and arrow ends, pinwheels, Xs with fancy ends...or the star in a diamond on the right of the middle row. Emphasize the horizontal/vertical plus or make it all about the middle star that pops out in the middle bottom row. The last one feels like a graphic flower with fancy pollen center and dark markings on the petals. This block definitely transforms into so many different types of images.  Black and white to help envision any palette!  And with lines to help "see" the pieces within the shapes. My two layouts with Bellissimo Star added:   I'm deep in designing a new collection this week so I'm keeping it short and sweet for now! Happy sewing everyone!   Happy week 6 of Moda Blockheads! This is an especially fun week for me since it is MY block this week AND I am sharing my SETTING PLAN for my quilt. Just a couple quick things about me, in case you are new to Moda Blockheads or new to me: 1. I try to do a weekly "color study" for the new blocks and I play with color and light and dark placement to see how those factors influence how the final block looks. I post them each week on my blog and in the facebook group and on my instagram account. 2. I've been designing fabric for Moda, going on 10 years! I started working with them after winning the Fabric8 competition on spoonflower.com, which Moda sponsored. It has been a wonderful experience working with them and I am happy to design floral inspired lines and have basics collections of Thatched and Dotty Thatched too. 3. I design quilt patterns and a lot of my patterns span a modern-to-transitional feel. I am a very spacial/visual learner so I try to diagram my patterns a lot with visuals. 4. A common question I get is about what computer program I use to create my color studies. I use Adobe Illustrator. I have EQ8 but am most comfortable on Illustrator so that is what I always go back to. So let's get on to this week's block!  MOONBEAM. Can you see the arrows of light as they shoot off into space? Whether you see this as a moon or flower, I think the directionality of the corners and potential for layered light in the center nine-patch offer lots of interesting elements to play with. I love the simplicity of stitch and flip corners and each of the four snowball units use those. If you struggle with getting those to be even, have no fears here, since this block does not require the angled corners on those snowballs to match other seams precisely. If they did, sometimes using a little glue to hold pieces in place is helpful to getting accurate snowball corners. For those instances I put the glue on the two pieces facing right sides together, on the part I will be cutting off , just a little bit away from the seam I am sewing.  Color studies for Moonbeam. The last one feels the most moon-like to me with glowing white against a dark inky sky. My other experiments feel like flowers, plaid explosions, double sided arrows or arrows that change direction and now point IN vs OUT. This block can be busy and complex or simplified down to mostly arrows, like the middle one shows. After all this experimenting with color studies...I still went with a sewn block that is most like the first one. Here is the color study done in black and white, without the color influence:  When working in color, I did not see how much the white corners stood out until I saw it in black and white. It is very helpful to take photos of your pieces when you lay them out and then make the photo black and white to see what your contrast levels are. And with the dividing lines of the actual block construction:  The quilt block pattern for this block as well as the past week's blocks are on the Moda blog at: https://my.modafabrics.com/inspiration-resources/blockheads-6-archive Sewn blocks in my two color palettes: Popsicle and Snuggly. Keep reading to see the full plan I have for these blocks and how I will be laying them out. If you want previous information about these two palettes, I've posted about them at the start of the sew along at www.robinpickens.com/blog/moda-blockheads-6-begins  Here is the block done for both the Popsicle and Snuggle palettes.  I wanted to share my layout idea for my quilt. There are a few sizes for this sew along. I decided to make the biggest block the center, focus on next largest as four corners, and surround those corners with smaller blocks. By adding additional half square triangle units I am making a giant star-like or X block.  I also wanted cohesive color groupings within the quadrants so I focused families of warm or cool in corners for Popsicle. For Snuggly palette I separated pinks or browns.  In order to differentiate between an area of color that is the quilt setting and the colors that will have a quilt block in them, I shaded down the block areas with white. The full color areas are the quilt setting additional pieces I am creating.   Each side will have star points created from half square triangles. I'm making 4 1/2" finished HST so starting with 5 1/2" squares, trimming to 5" and then assembling into the bigger triangle edges. The bigger blocks face each othr to make the overall star points for the quilt body layout.  The background cutting to get these side pieces requires 26" of fabric. I'd get 7/8ths of a yard to have some room for error. Or you may have lots of extra background fabric already from the blocks you are making and will not need to supplement as much extra fabric. From background material, you will need (8) 9 1/2" x 5" rectangles, (8) 5" x 5" squares and (12) 5 1/2" x 5 1/2" squares. You will also need a total of (6) 5 1/2" squares each of A/B/C and D/E/F to make the half square triangles. I've used different combinations on my color quadrant sides so I am using a variety of colors to make up my A/B/C and D/E/F squares.  I've used a simple two-at-a-time construction for making my HST, with a line diagonally, corner to corner and sewing 1/4" to each side of the line. I press to dark side and trim to 5". Then I assemble my rows or columns as shown below:  This is what my sewn sides look like in Snuggly and Popsicle:     This 27 1/2" x 14" block will be the center of the four sides of the quilt top. I also have rectangles and squares of colors that run up to the star points. A quilt block will be in that smaller square area within the side of color bands. For the color bands, cut 14" x 9 1/2" rectangles in colors that match with your star HST ends. You will also need either (2) 5" x 5" squares or (1) 9 1/2" x 5" rectangle per side to be at the base of the quilt block from the sew along. Because my colors are split into quadrants, I'm mixing those colors in to the blocks that go in those spaces to continue the color split.  I hope this makes sense! You can simplify by using all one palette. I just decided to switch it up a little and do multiple color groupings, because more color is something I usually like! The other twist for me is mixing regular Thatched and Dotty Thatched. Same colors but there is a lot of interest to me in having that subtle change of dots or no dots, sort of like another layer of depth and texture. The Snuggle palette looks like there might be some dotty in those mocked up spaces but that quilt will be all regular Thatched. I think it will be interesting to see how much difference there is between the two quilts when they are all done. Here is a peek of how my layout looks with the blocks we have done so far.   And here are the groups of sewn blocks so far!! Many thanks to Melina for working on these. Otherwise I'd still be doing some catch-up!   Please feel free to pop back over here to see any new blog posts or color studies. I also have a facebook group "Robin Pickens Sew Happy Community" where we will be doing a little sewing together in July of my Bar Hop quilt pattern. And you can find me on Pinterest, instagram as @RobinPickens or on my youtube channel youtube.com/c/robinpickens. Thanks for sewing along and being a part of this wonderful Moda Blockheads experience! Robin  Week 5 of Moda Blockheads6 with Dew Drops from Chelsi Stratton of Sherri & Chelsi. So many options with this block! I hope these color studies help you see your way to stitching fun!  Red X in the middle? Bowties to the outer corners? Emphasize the star points or the overall X shape? Number 7 becomes a propeller. Number 8 makes a lovely shape with the cat-ear sides on point. The last row splits the color bands diagonally to make woven ribbons of color. I don't know which is my favorite this week but I am pretty partial to numbers 8 and 12.  Black and white and with the lines below. This week, with all the pieces, the lines can really make a difference in making sense of these color studies. As always, if you want to be inspired to try one of these, you may need to cut more pieces or differently than the directions tell you. But there are so many ways to experiment and play with the shapes and colors this week! Thanks Chelsi!  Sewn blocks...Melina has been busy sewing away on these. Thank you Melina! With this block, nesting seams works well for lining up quarter-square-triangles. And with the stitch and flip on three sides of the X for the center, it is important to have the angles lined up well. If you feel the pieces are difficult to keep straight for the stitch and flip, then try a little glue on the part you will be cutting off to hold them steady when sewing those seams.  These were Snuggly Palette!  And with the Dotty Thatched they are for the Popsicle Palette. Thought that little accent pop of green was fun and lively.   Next week is my block and I'll be sharing my idea for how I am doing the setting for this quilt. I'm so excited to show you my plans and color layouts. Till then...happy sewing!
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About ROBINDesigner of colorful florals and Thatched basics for Moda Fabrics . Modern to transitional quilt designer, cross stitch designer, sewist, crafter. I am proud to be a designer for Moda Fabrics!
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