*What to do with all these teeny tiny scraps?*

I promised you an idiot-proof way to make speedy quilt blocks, so here goes…

As you can imagine, I have quite a collection of fabric scraps that, until recently, didn’t have a purpose. Large enough scraps from projects can be used for making jelly roll strips, beeswax wraps and even face masks. But what to do with the little bitty ones? What. To. Do.

I recently discovered the paper piecing technique, which I’ve heard described as the “paint by numbers” version of quilting. Essentially, you stitch fabric to a paper template, remove the paper and BAM! a perfectly pieced quilt block.

Here’s what I did with my bag of green scraps:

The paper template that I used was a 10” square of tissue paper. The first strip was placed right down the middle with the next piece sewn alongside (figures 1 and 2) building out until I had a sloppy looking mess of fabric sewn together (figure 3). But flip it over and you will see the paper square I used as a guide for carefully trimming (figure 4). Once trimmed, I ripped off the tissue paper and, lo and behold, a beautiful square appeared. This process took all of 5 minutes and used even the tiniest bits of fabric (especially near the corners).

I’m aiming for a modest 16 block quilt top, so will be finishing off soon. The fun part will be placing the squares together in a pleasing pattern, but here’s where I’m headed:

I used a narrow white strip for the centre of each block. I think it adds an interesting “window-pane” effect.

I’m loving the bright, spring-like green tones and can’t wait to show you the final product soon!

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Lucky Squares