Oh, hey, math

Ya know, I warned y'all that I can be a complete ditz at math.  Square roots, fine.  Find the volume of a truncated cone?  Fine.  Multiply a couple of numbers and add the sums?  Hmmm.
So, I was figuring out in this post how many nine-patches I'd need for my borders for the Starry Nine Patch (and by the way, from this moment forward, this quilt will be named Katie's Star Patch.  Because I decided.) and I doubled 15 and doubled 18 and added 4 for the corners and got an answer of 80.
And not one of you called me out on that answer?!?
Twice 15 is 30 and twice 18 is 36, and 30 + 36 +  4 is actually 70.  Not 80.
Luckily I was planning to make some extra nine-patches anyway, but still.  At least now I'll know when I'm done sewing triangles to nine-patches.  And I'll stop.  Whew.
I didn't bother to take any photos of the growing piles of nine-patches with triangles sewn to them.  They look the same as the ones in my last post, only there's more of them.
So, since I didn't actually need the center of Katie's Star Patch laid out anymore, I rolled it up and started using my Design Floor for my Garden Party, just to see how far I've gotten with it.
For a leaders-enders project, this thing is just sailing right along!

I keep a couple of hot cross buns blocks cut and lined up at all times (Though sometimes I have to work extra hard not to confuse them with the nine-patches I'm building.  Some of their construction points look remarkably similar...) and I've got stacks of orange nine-patches and squares at the ready.  I'm charmed by the fact that this is a quilt that's being built in the spaces.  It's like pulling blocks out of the air, fully formed and perfect and mysterious.  Sheer magic.
The other fun thing about this quilt is the sheer chaos of the fabrics.  I've got everything in there:  there's fabric from every decade from 1950 onward to just last month, plus some Civil War reproductions that I'd forgotten I had.

The only thing you won't find is 1930's reproductions.  And the only reason there aren't any of those in there is that I've never bought any, because I don't want to get them confused with the 1930's fabrics I have which are actually from the 1930's.  (My grandmother gave me fabric from her stash, as well as some blocks that her mother-in-law pieced back in the late 1920's or early '30's.   (When I come across them, I'll post pictures!))




And now we're at the point where Liz should close the post, because I'm about to talk about the swap quilt.


Ready?


No peeking.


(Unless you've changed your mind and really want to peek.  I'm okay with that.   Totally your choice.)


No going back now. 


Not kidding.


Five, four, three,


two, one...



Okay, here we go.  I pieced one more Ohio Star block and decided to set them on point.  (I'm just a sucker for on point.)  (You may have noticed that already.)  I assembled them with some blue squares and some madder paisley triangles.
And started dithering on the borders.  Of course.  Because that's what I do.
Here's the only mockup I took a photo of:

and a close up:

I'm going to sleep on it, but I think I like the narrow light paisley border, and then that dark blue.  I also auditioned a darkish brown with a tan ferny pattern on it, but it was sort of gloomy looking.  Gloomy isn't really the look I'm going for here.  Since the quilt group's focus is small quilts of Civil War antecedents, I'm trying to keep it in character and stifle my urges for zingy squirrely orange spiral prints, but I'm not wanting it to lean too far the other way, either.  Pretty.  That's what I'm going for.  Not gloomy.  Pretty.

Happy.  Happy works, too.





(Oops!  Forgot the most important thing!  Linking to Oh Scrap! at Quilting is more fun than Housework.  Go see all the pretties!)