Picket Lines

Over on Stashbuster's I saw a quilt in this week's album that really inspired me. It was called Picket Fence and I was just itching to try it! After ruminating on it for a day or so, I remembered a gallon baggie that I've hoarded since October 2011. It was a swap of bonus strips that were all 2 1/2" wide, cut half width of fabric, with no particular theme or color. So I had 100 of these!

I sorted out the lights and the mediums and only worked with the darks. I cut the dark strips into 2 1/2" X 4 1/2" bricks. Then, remember those creamy neutrals that I had made into a home made jelly roll for my guild's Penny Sale? Well, I had cut a few extras for myself, too. So I used those as my lights, cutting those also into 2 1/2" X 4 1/2" bricks. Armed with light and dark identical bricks, I was ready to start to play!

You take a light and a dark and lap the ends at a right angle, right sides together, as if you were joining binding strips on the bias.

I sewed through on the diagonal by getting it started at the first corner, then placing my index finger on the end point corner, so that I could see where I was aiming. As Bonnie Hunter would say, "Aim and shoot!"

I finger-pressed the units to the dark side. The large 12 1/2" block is made up of four quadrants that are 6 1/2" unfinished but will finish at 6" in the quilt. For each quadrant, you need two light/dark units, and one dark/dark unit, for a total of three units making up one single quadrant.

It is very important to make the units all the same way.

I had such fun making these and then joining four together to make the center star "pop"!

I got two made, here is the second one:

It doesn't show in these pictures, but as I worked on the singleton units, I DID take the time to sew the extra seam to make bonus triangle squares, a la Bonnie K. Hunter. Someday, Ocean Waves!