Design Wall Monday - 4/29/13

DESIGN WALL MONDAY - 4/29/13
Check out all of us who link up with Judy L. at Patchwork Times on Mondays.
We have some awesome stuff on our walls!
Well, THEY do - ME - not so much sometimes - ;))
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If you read yesterday’s Sunday Squirrels -

Squirrel #1 - A 9-Patch Experiment won - ;))

I have a collection of 5” charm sets -
And a bunch of pre-cut 10” squares -
That I have yet to use -

But most of the patterns that I see -
Call for the 5” squares -
To be cut down to 4-1/2” squares - ;))

And I REALLY don’t like the idea -
Of cutting them down -
So that they can finish at 4” -

Just because 4” is an easier number to work with - ;))

If you do some MATH -
And I know that it’s a four-letter word for some of you -

BUT -

If you do some MATH -
You will see that a 5” charm = 5 x 5 = 25 square inches of fabric -
And a 4-1/2” x 4-1/2” square = 20-1/4 square inches of fabric -

And that makes 4-3/4 square inches of WASTE on EACH charm - ;))

The WASTE on 6 charms would be 28-1/2 square inches -
And another WHOLE charm is only 25 square inches -
So for every 6 charms that you cut down to 4-1/2” -

You are WASTING MORE than ONE of them - ;))

That’s a LOT of fabric! -

On top of the fact that they are ALREADY pre-cut at 5” -
So why do I need to WASTE my TIME as well -
Cutting them down to a DIFFERENT size? -

Because the MATH doesn’t work? -

REALLY??? - Come on!!! - ;))

SO -

My brain said that I didn’t want to do that -
And that I could do SOMETHING ELSE - ;))

I could do an EXPERIMENT -

I could use them AS IS -

At 5” x 5” square -

And see what happened - ;))

So I did - ;))

It may have been done before -

But I call it my Lazy Lefty 9-Patch - ;))

It's a traditional block -
Made in the traditional way -
But with a slight twist -

It's NOT symmetrical - ;))

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Note - these instructions are written in LEFTISH.
If you are right-handed - just reverse the directions.
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Match a BROWN and MUSLIN 5” square -
And cut three strips -
1-1/2” - 1-1/2” - and 2” (the left-over) -

Sew the 1-1/2” pairs together -
Make two sets -
Press them open -

And match the BROWN wider strip to one side of one -
And the MUSLIN wider strip to the other side of the other -

Sew them together -
And press them open -

Making sure to match the wider 2" strips (on top) -
Cut them again into 3 strips -
1-1/2” - 1-1/2” - and 2” (the left-over) -

Sew the 1-1/2” strips together -
Making two sets -
One with the BROWN-MUSLIN-BROWN strip on top with the BROWN 2" patch leading -
One with the MUSLIN-BROWN-MUSLIN strip on top with the MUSLIN 2" patch leading -

Press them open -

And match one 2” sewn strip to one side of each of the 1-1/2” pairs -
Pay attention as they are NOT interchangeable -
One end patch on each 2” strip is longer than the other -
That’s where the extra 1/2” went - ;))
Sew them together -

Now you have two Lazy Lefty Nine-Patches -

One positive -
One negative - ;))

They should measure 4” -
And should finish at 3-1/2” - ;))

The center square should measure 1” x 1” -
And -
One corner square should measure 1-1/4” x 1-1/4” -
And the opposite corner square should measure 1-3/4” x 1-3/4” -

The other sections will measure odd bits -

But who cares -

The blocks are what they are -

And THEY WILL ALL BE THE SAME - ;))

Remember my Rule #5? -

Rule #5 - Sometimes Blocks don't have to be the RIGHT SIZE -
they just have to be the SAME SIZE!

Well -

As long as they all measure 4” -

And all finish at 3-1/2” -

I can work with that - ;))

I figured that they may not play well with other sized blocks -

But they should play well with themselves each other - ;))

So I chose an assortment of 10” squares -
And cut a bunch of 5” muslin squares -

Each 10” square can be cut into 4 - 5” charm squares -
And with 4 matching muslin squares -
I can get 8 blocks -

So the experiment continues - ;))

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SPECIAL NOTE -

I made my 9-Patches using Billie Lauder’s method -
She calls it her Nine Patch Units - 2 from 2 Method -
Quick Quilt Tricks - 2nd Edition - (c) 2002 -

Because I did NOT cut the 5” squares down first -
So that the measurement was easily divisible by 3 -
And cut the strips at 1-1/2” - 1-1/2” - and 2” -
And -
Because I chose to place the wider strip to one side -
My 9-Patches are NOT symmetrical - ;))

IF I had placed the wider strip in the middle -
The 9-Patch probably would have been symmetrical -
But I would not have been able to use Billie’s method - ;))

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Talk to you later - gotta go - gotta sew -