It’s me and my scrap pile again! I am feverishly working on ways to use up 3½” triangles. I have at least 500 of them! These have come mostly from the offcuts my Lollipops & Licorice pattern created.
I have faithfully trimmed these offcuts into neat little piles of 3½” triangles and stacked them up in my stash. After making a half dozen Lollipops & Licorice quilts, I have quite a few piles of these neat little stacks. It was time to use some up!
I grabbed the piles of brighter pastel ones, and on a whim, also grabbed a half dozen striped 6½” triangle blocks I'd made some time ago. Sometimes, I sew leftover strips together to get a standard size and then cut triangles from them. They come in handy when the scrappy mood strikes :)
Because my striped blocks were already 6½”, I decided to keep that as the standard size for the rest of the blocks. Here you can see four 3½” triangles sewn together will make a 6 ½” triangle block.
I separated my triangles into general colors and began sewing pairs together. I didn't plan a masterful layout to get my colors just right, I just sewed.
In no time at all, I had a huge stack of triangle blocks ready to go on the design wall. And when I say no time at all, I mean I got this far in an hour!
Now to start the layout. I laid out the scrappy triangle blocks into horizontal rows, adding one of the striped blocks randomly into each row. I ended up with six rows of nine blocks each.
Now to fill in the right and left zigzag edges. These involve one full triangle and two half triangles. Make six each right-facing and left-facing versions (mirror images).
Here it is all laid out with the rows each having a half-block end cap. At this point, I was bothered. I didn’t like it as much as I had in my head! Haha! I knew it was going to be busy, but this was busy on an uncomfortable level. I had to do something to calm it down!
I rummaged around for a semi calm solid color that would go with all these prints. I found this very soft but sparkly green shade. I cut a 6 ½” strip of that and then cut nine 6½” triangles, and two wedge triangles, from the end of the strip.
And just like that, I loved it! I pulled several blocks from the rows and replaced them with the soft green triangles. The blocks I pulled made up an extra row in length so they did not go to waste. The quilt was now seven rows of nine blocks and ended up measuring 36” x 43” when it was done… perfect for a baby or child's size quilt.
I sewed the horizontal rows together, then sewed the rows to each other. I was surprised at how adding those green triangles helped the striped triangles stand out a little more.
And here it is! Another pile of scraps was conquered, and a lesson was learned in color composition. Sometimes, we just need to calm down ;)
Happy Sunday everyone,
Krista
Follow all my quilty adventures on Instagram, Facebook, and Pinterest. Visit my YouTube channel for free tutorials and tips. If you like my patterns, you can buy them on Etsy, and here on the website.