Rainbow Rose QAL Week 4: Centre Star

Welcome back to week 4 of our Rainbow Rose QAL

First up congratulations to Imelda who won our third prize of the QAL (by linking up to last weeks post), a fat quarter bundle from the Quilt Shop Tuam!

For our schedule see the QAL tab at the top of this page.  We are exploring the colour wheel and making this block, the Rainbow Rose, in your choice of 2 sizes to make either a 40” x 40” baby quilt or a larger lap or bed quilt 80” x 80”.

Prizes!

This weeks post is sponsored by Sew Crafty Fabrics, who have sponsored a prize of fat quarters to the value of €20 to a lucky winner, who links up to this weeks post on piecing the centre Star of our Rainbow Rose.

To win this bundle, link up a photo, instagram or flickr image, or a blog post of your progress on the Rainbow Rose block by clicking the blue linky button at the end of this post.  Random number generator will choose a winner to be announced next week!  The linky will be open until midnight next Tuesday and the winner announced next Wednesday when we move onto assembling our quilt!

Piecing : Lastly we come to the centre star!
1.  Take the remaining 4 background fabric squares 5" x 5" for the baby quilt or 10" x 10" for the bed quilt and cut in half along the diagonal. Remember if you are not used to handling bias edges you can starch your squares before cutting to make them easier to work with and avoid stretching out of shape.
 

2.  Gather up your remaining coloured triangles - you should have 4 left from the corners and 8 left from the middle sections. You will need 16, so from your colour wheel fabric, choose colours to blend with what you have.

It can be helpful in choosing the fabric to arrange your on hand pieces into a star shape, so you can see what works best together and what colours you are missing.

3.  Again, to make the triangles needed cut 5" x 5" square or 10" x 10" from your fabric.

4.  Cut in half along the diagonal to make two identical triangles.  You will have extras and can use them to make a label for the back of your quilt if you like!

5.  Pair the colour triangles for the star points with a background fabric triangle, by placing right sides together.  For the remaining colour triangles pair as per the diagram or your chosen layout in step 2.  Place right sides together.
 
6.  Sew along the diagonal edge using a 1/4" seam and press open or to the side as you prefer.

7.  Trim to 4 1/2" x 4 1/2" for the baby quilt or 9 1/2" x 9 1/2" for the bed quilt.

8.  Sew the 4 HST for the centre in a pinwheel formation by sewing in rows and then sewing the rows together.

9.  The star points will make up the bottom section of the blocks we made for our middles. The star is set opposite the outer wheel in terms of colour. The orange and yellow points of the star are pointing towards the blues, purples and pinks and the greens against the reds.

Sew the star points to the bottom of your middle sections as follows:

The star points will then be sewn on to the centre block next week when we look at final assembly & borders!

Exploring the Colour Wheel:

Colours on opposite sides of the colour wheel are called complimentary colours - they have the most contrast with each other and in reality clash quite a bit but still somehow manage to go together! If you want to draw attention to something, using high contrast like complimentary colours, will attract the eye. A classic complimentary colour combo is the Christmas Red & Green. I'm quite partial to Blue & Orange though not so much Yellow & Purple!

Orienting our star within our colour wheel this way just adds a bit more contrast to the colour placing and I hope makes for an interesting quilt block!

A split complimentary colour scheme is a variation on complimentary. Instead of using a colour directly opposite on the wheel, use the two colours that are on either side of your opposite colour. e.g. Instead of Red and Green, use Red with Blue-Green + Yellow-Green.

A tetradic scheme uses 4 colours that form a rectangle on the colour wheel and is composed of 2 pairs of complimentary colours.  As such, it can be overpowering if equal amounts of the 4 colours are used! Using one of the colours as an accent in small amounts can be more pleasing!

A triadic scheme uses 3 colours that are equidistant on the wheel like Purple, Orange and Green or Yellow-orange, Blue-green, Red-purple. This can be a really fun combination to play with!

Next week we’re onto final assembly and completing our quilt top!

Remember to link up a photo, Instagram/Flickr post or blog post on your Rainbow Rose progress to win this brilliant prize of a fat quarter bundle from Sew Crafty Fabrics! Click on the blue button below to add your image.



Thank you to all our very generous sponsors.  Please share the love and visit our sponsors by clicking on each of the photos below! 

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Rainbow Rose QAL Week 3: The Corners

Welcome back!  We are onto week 3 of our Rainbow Rose QAL!

First up, congratulations to Bernadette Walsh, who won our second prize of the Quilt-A-Long (QAL) by linking up a photo posted on our Facebook page to last weeks linky.  A fat quarter bundle of Tilda fabric from Giddy Goats Craft is on the way to you!

You can link up any progress on the QAL every week to enter the draw for our brilliant prizes.  For our schedule, see the QAL tab at the top of this page and the last weeks posts, on choosing fabric for your block here and cutting and starting to piece our block here.

Over the coming weeks we are going to be exploring the colour wheel and making this block, the Rainbow Rose, in your choice of 2 sizes to make either a 40” x 40” baby quilt or a larger lap or bed quilt 80” x 80”.

Prizes!
This weeks post is sponsored by The Quilt Shop Tuam, who have sponsored a prize of fat quarters to the vaule of €20 to a lucky winner who links up to this weeks post on piecing the corner sections of our Rainbow Rose.   

To win this bundle, link up a photo, instagram or flickr image, or a blog post of your progress on the Rainbow Rose block by clicking the blue linky button at the end of this post.  Random number generator will choose a winner to be announced next week!  The linky will be open until midnight next Tuesday and the winner announced next Wednesday when we move onto piecing the corners of our block!

Ready for some more piecing?
For the corners of the Rainbow Rose block, we will need approximately 4 prints per corner. You can go scrappy and use all different fabrics or you can use the same prints to make up the spikes on the outer corners as in the diagram below as a guideline if you wish.  

To make the corners:
1.  Take 6 background fabric (BGF) squares 5" for the baby quilt or 10" for the larger quilt. As per previous you can starch the squares before further cutting to make handling the bias edges easier. Cut in half along the diagonal to make 12 triangles.

2. Take 4 coloured squares per corner, 5" for the baby quilt or 10" for the larger quilt. Cut in half along the diagonal to make 8 triangles for each colour (32 triangles in total).

Each corner will need:

You will have 1 coloured triangle left over - put that aside for the centre star next week.

3. Make the Half Square Triangles.

There are 3 coloured HST paired up with background fabric shown as A pieces in the diagram.  The remaining triangles are paired by placing two coloured triangles together marked B.

It helps to lay them out first and decide on how you want the colours to look for your corner pieces.

4.  Place the matching triangles right sides together and sew along the diagonal edge with a 1/4" seam.

5.  Press open and trim to 4 1/2" x 4 1/2" for the baby quilt or 9 1/2" x 9 1/2" for the bed quilt.

6.  Arrange the pieces in columns as shown: 

• Column 1 is made up of a background fabric rectangle and an A Half Square Triangle.  
• Column 2 is made up of a background fabric square, a coloured square and a B Half Square Triangle.
• Column 3 is made up of a an A Half Square Triangle, a B Half Square Triangle and the remaining A Half Square Triangle.

7. Sew the columns together pressing open or pressing to the side as you prefer. If pressing to the side press columns 1 and 3 toward the top and 2 towards the bottom to nest the seams.


8.  Finally sew the columns together to complete your corner block.
 
9.  Repeat for all 4 colors so you have 4 corner blocks as shown.

 
10.  Trim to 12 1/2" x 12 1/2" for the baby quilt and 27 1/2" x 27 1/2" for the bed quilt if necessary.

Exploring the Colour wheel
 
In colour theory, Hue is a term that is used with saturaton and brightness to describe a colour that is displayed on your monitor (HSB) or sometimes Hue, Saturation and Luminence (HSL) or sometimes lightness.  In paints and pigments, hue is taken to mean the pure form of a colour on the colour wheel without any white or black added to it. 

Add white to a colour and you get a Tint.  Adding white to red gets you pink!  Adding white to a hue tends to lighten it and de-saturate it – think Pastels.  Colour schemes using tints usually evoke a feeling of softness and gentleness.

Add black to a colour and you get a Shade.  Shades tend to darken and can result in rich, intense colours.  Think of a rich deep garnet ring or a dark blue sapphire!

If you add white and black together you get grey.  Adding grey to a hue gives you a Tone. Think dusty colours.  I must admit fabrics with a lot of grey tones in them are the least used in my stash, so I think I will try harder to get them into my next project!

As you have seen in our first weeks post on selecting fabric, in order to get colours to blend going around the colour wheel, you need to include some tints, tones and shades.  Pink is a tint that has a colour name all to itself.  I like to think of light blue as sky blue or baby blue.  In painting, an artist quite often chooses a dominant colour and an accent.  When choosing your next fabric pull for a future project, try a palette of blenders in your dominant colour and remember to add a shade to give some richness, and an accent colour to add a bit of pop!

Remember to win this fat quarter selection from Quilt Shop Tuam, link up a photo, Instagram/ Flickr image or blog post by clicking on the blue button below:


Thank you to all our very generous sponsors.  Please share the love and visit our sponsors by clicking on each of the photos below! 

Click on images below to visit our sponsors shops:
        

Rainbow Rose QAL Week 2: Cutting & Piecing

Welcome back to week 2 of our Rainbow Rose QAL

First up congratulations to Olena who linked up a blog post and won our first prize of the QAL by linking up to last weeks post, a fat quarter bundle from LoveFabric.ie!

You can link up any progress on the QAL every week to enter the draw for our brilliant prizes.  For our schedule, see the QAL tab at the top of this page and last weeks post on choosing fabric for your block here.  Over the coming weeks we are going to be exploring the colour wheel and making this block, the Rainbow Rose, in your choice of 2 sizes to make either a 40” x 40” baby quilt or a larger lap or bed quilt 80” x 80”.

Prizes!

This weeks post is sponsored by Giddygoats Craft who have sponsored a prize of 5 fat quarters of Tilda fabric to the value of €20 to a lucky winner who links up to this weeks post.  We are onto cutting your background fabric and piecing the middle sections of our Rainbow Rose!

To win this bundle beautifully modelled by The Tilda dolls, link up a photo, instagram or flickr image, or a blog post of your progress on the Rainbow Rose block by clicking the blue linky button at the end of this post.  Random number generator will choose a winner to be announced next week!  The linky will be open until midnight next Tuesday and the winner announced next Wednesday when we move onto piecing the corners of our block!

Ready to start cutting up some fabric?
 
Let's start with the 40" x 40" baby quilt!
Background Fabric - 1 yard
I've prepared this cutting chart to help make the most efficient use of the fabric.

 

We will need to cut our yard of fabric into strips along the width of fabric (WOF).

1. Cut 2 strips 5" wide
2. Sub-cut strip 1 into 8 squares 5" x 5"
3. Sub-cut strip 2 into 6 squares 5" x 5" and 2 squares 4 1/2" x 4 1/2"
4. Cut 5 strips 4 1/2" wide
5. Sub-cut 1 of the strips into 4 rectangles 4 1/2" x 8 1/2"

The remaining strips will be used to make the borders. We will measure our finished block before trimming the borders to their final size but for now:
   6.  Take 2 of the strips and cut 1 square 4 1/2"x 4 1/2" from each of the strips and put the remaining aside.

If you are not working from yardage you will need the following:

   *minimum length given - we will trim borders to final size once block is complete and the average width and height is measured.

80" x 80" Larger Lap/Bed Quilt
I've rounded up 1/4 yard to allow a little room for straightening up the fabric at the beginning and during cutting to give yourself a clean line. The most efficient way to cut your background fabric for the larger quilt is given in the cutting chart.
 

1. From one end of your yardage cut two strips 9 1/2" x Width of fabric.
2. Sub-cut into 4 rectangles 9 1/2" x 18 1/2"
3. To avoid piecing our borders we are going to use a traditional quilting technique of cutting along the selvedge edge!
4. Cut 2 strips 10" wide by length of fabric.
5. Sub-cut each strip into 7 squares 10" x 10" and 2 squares 9 1/2" x 9 1/2.  Total of 14 squares 10" x 10" and 4 squares 9 1/2" x 9 1/2".
6. From the remaining fabric cut 4 strips 4 1/2" x length of fabric. Again we will measure our finished block before trimming the borders to their final size so put aside for now

If you are not working from yardage you will need the following:

*minimum length given - we will trim borders to final size once block is complete and the average width and height is measured.

Dealing with bias
So far all of the cuts we have made have been on the straight grain of fabric. We have cut vertically along the width and for the larger quilt horizontally along the selvedge.

To make the Half Square Triangles for the Rainbow Rose block we will need to cut our 5" and 10" background fabric squares in half along the diagonal and expose the bias edge.


As every HST is different it would be quite tricky to try and make them using the drawn line method and containing the bias edge. Instead, cutting along the diagonal gives us pieces we can mix and match for our outer ring and inner 8 pointed star.
The bias edge is stretchy and should be handled as little as possible so as not to pull it out of shape before it is sewn to a matching HST. One thing that can help with this is starch!
 

Two years ago when we were cutting triangles for the Triangle-A-Long @ the Sassy Quilter we starched the fabric twice! Yes it was a little stiff but it worked! If you don't have starch or a starch alternative like Best Press just be careful in the handling and you will be fine! If you have starch on hand (bought mine at the local Centra for 2 Euro) spray your 5" and 10" squares and press with a hot iron.

To minimise handling we are going to cut the HST's as we go along!

To start with, let's have a look at the middle pieces which are each made up of 2 squares and 2 HST with background fabric!

Exploring the Colour Wheel
The colours I have chosen for my middles are Red, Yellow, Blue-Green and Purple.

For some reason quite a few people dislike purple and to be fair, it is one of those colours that can be hard to find for stash fabrics. It is considered the colour of European Royalty as the pigments used to make purple were very expensive and not everyone could afford them! In our Rainbow Rose block you need 2 -4 colours of purple. We are using it to bridge moving from blue to pink so a blue toned and a red toned purple would work perfectly!

Red and yellow are warm colours in the colour wheel. The other warm colour is orange. By contrast green, blue, indigo and violet are considered cool colours. However, you can get some warmth within a colour family. Green and purple being the closest to the warm colours can have lots of variation in terms of warmth & coolness.  There are some greens that look warm when next to a cooler version of green, but when compared with an orange, that same green will look cool again.  Colours interact with each other.  Warm colours advance towards you and cool colours tend to sit back. Some of my favourite quilts are those that  mix warm and cool colours in a quilt top (half square triangles and chevron quilts can be very effective using this type of colour palette). 

When talking about colour temperature, I’m always reminded of Trinny and Susannah  from What Not To Wear who said, if you are going to wear red, instead of pairing it with black – keep it hot! I’m not sure I’m up for a red/orange outfit but when it comes to red, a little can go a long way! It commands attention and is the reason it is used in safety signs the world over - think of the big stop sign at the end of the road!  Red is also one of those colours that can be hard to work with tonally. If you look at the colour card there are oodles and oodles of blue colours but not too many reds. We are not using red or yellow to bridge a gap so, as close to true red and yellow as you can get will be perfect.

Yellow is another colour that can be hard to find both in traditional quilts and for stash fabric. The rich warm buttercup yellow is one I am particularly drawn to. The colder lime yellow is actually more eye catching than deep sunflower yellow and is used more on ambulances and emergency vehicles that want to catch our attention when we are driving, so we can get out of the way when needed!  Think of this the next time you want to add a pop of colour to your quilt or draw attention to a particular place in your design!

Finally, for Blue-Green you can use used a mixture of aqua/turquoise/cyan/teal depending on the green and blue colours you are using on either side. This is a bridge colour like the purples and we want to blend with the fabrics before and after.

Cutting & Piecing the Middle Section
1.  Take 4 background fabric squares, 5" for the baby quilt and 10" for the larger bed quilt.
2.  Cut in half along the diagonal to make 2 background triangles per square, 8 in total. 
3.  From the red, yellow, purple and blue-green fabrics you have chosen for the centre sections cut the following from each colour:

• 2 squares 5" x 5" for the baby quilt and 10" x 10" squares for the bed quilt
• 2 squares 4 1/2" x 4 1/2" for the baby quilt and 9 1/2" x 9 1/2" squares for the larger quilt

4.  Cut each of the 5" or 10" squares in half along the diagonal to make 2 identical triangles and put one triangle aside for the 8 pointed star we are going to make later.

5.  Pair each of your coloured triangles with a background fabric triangle by placing right sides together and sew 1/4" seam along the diagonal edge.

6.  Press open or to the side as you prefer and trim to 4 1/2" square for the baby quilt and 9 1/2" square for the larger lap/bed quilt.
 
7.  Make 2 purple, 2 red, 2 yellow and 2 blue-green.

8.  Layout in rows as follows and sew 2 triangles to make row 1 and 2 squares to make row 2.

9.  Finally sew the rows together to complete middle pieces measuring 8 1/2" square for the baby quilt and 18 1/2" square for the larger quilt.

Put aside until we assemble the quilt block!

Remember to win the fat quarter bundle from Giddygoats Craft, link up a photo, Instagram/ Flickr image or blog post by clicking on the blue button below:
 


Thank you to all our very generous sponsors.  Please share the love and visit our sponsors by clicking on each of the photos below! 

Click on images below to visit our sponsors shops: