Gypsy Wife: Section 6 Part 1

Welcome to Section 6. This section is made up of a lot of blocks, 21 to be exact, but we are going to do them over 4 weeks instead of 2. This is to keep it fun and lower the pressure. So we will do 9 blocks this week and on April 2 I will post the second part. The whole section is pictured on page 28.

This week we will be making:
1x Indian Hatchet pg 12, 6" finished
1x Nurses Cross pg 14, 8" finished
1x Pinwheel Block pg 19, 4" finished
2x Bordered Pinwheel Block pg 19, 6" finished
1x Courthouse Steps Block pg 20, 5" finished
2x Courthouse Steps Block pg 20, 4" finished
1x Bordered Hourglass Block pg 21, 4" finished

Indian Hatchet: A straightforward main block, that finishes at 6". I chose 8 different fabrics for mine and used my simple folded corners ruler from Creative Grids to trim the diagonals rather than drawing a line and trimming afterwards.

Nurses Cross: This block has a lot of pieces, with several rounds and lots of triangles. I over cut some of them in order to have a little wiggle room. For the block construction your UU triangles are going to extend quite a ways past your rectangles, that's good they are supposed to, just stitch them down anyways and when you have the center complete you can trim it into a nice 4.5" square. For the next step, I cut the squares VV at 4" instead, than when they were stitched on, I pressed and trimmed the resulting block to 6.25" before continuing. I also cut the squares Aa at the full 2", and trimmed my final assembled block to 8.5" so that when it is in the quilt it will measure 8". Go slow with this one, stitch and press carefully and if you feel frustrated with it, walk away and come back to it later on, it really is a fun looking block when it is done.

On to the filler blocks for the section.

Pinwheel Blocks: We are going to actually make 3 pinwheel blocks that finish at 4", and than we will set one aside as finished and to the other two we will add a small border to make them a couple inches larger. Follow the instructions in the first column of page 19 for the full cutting and piecing instructions for all three.

Courthouse Steps: we are doing a total of 3 courthouse steps blocks in this section. 1 of them will have 3 rounds, the other 2 only 1 round. To cut and piece these we will follow the instructions for the last two blocks listed on page 20. I sewed all 3 at the same time so I could chain piece and not cut the thread each time, I just made sure I had my pieces nicely organized on my table beside me.
For the 5" finished block you will notice that round 2 is cut wider than 1 and 3, this is NOT a typo, so cut as the pattern says. if you are worried that your block is going to turn out to small, you can always cut the round 3 strips a little wider as well, and trim it to the correct size when it is all sewn.

Bordered Hourglass Block: If you set aside your extra hourglass block from section 1, you can use it now and just add the border and you are finished. Or you can choose to make a whole new block which is what I decided to do.

That's it for this part of the section.
Next time we have 12 square on square blocks to make, in a couple sizes,  and add some more borders to a couple as well.

I loved seeing everyone's section 5s. They all look so unbelievably different. As for the winner of the gift card that I mentioned last time, Congratulations go to Thelma Brown. If you missed her photos be sure to check them out under the photos tab. Her blocks are beautiful and are all done in various shades of blue with pops of yellow throughout!.
Thelma you can pick your $35 gift card up at the shop next time you stop in.

Kayla