My lime blue diamonds hand sewn quilt

Much earlier in the year I set out my quilt plans for 2025 with number 6 on the list being:

6. My English Paper Piecing (EPP) blue diamonds

This is my hand sewing project which I’ll take to my monthly sewing group evening meetings, and no doubt will pick up in between those too, as it’s a good project for keeping my hands busy. The diamonds are small - I like a challenge, clearly! - and I’m using pre-loved fabric for this. The central diamonds will be various blues from MOH’s old shirts - some patterned, some plain and each of these will be outlined with bright lime diamonds, which is material left over from another project long ago.

As the diamonds are small, my updated plan is to place much larger diamonds between the hand sewn blocks, which will help with progress! I’ve got an old embroidered tablecloth which I bought on eBay for this - which may be a bit controversial for some cutting this up, but I’m ok with it. Whether or not I’d cut up a family heirloom is another matter, but that’s not something I need to consider for this project.

Introducing my EPP project

As I said it’s a hand sewing project, but one which needs to be pretty portable so for this I’m using my Yarnivore project bag from Vicki Brown Designs a while back - and while it’s not descriptive of the contents, it’s a great size for this project. I’m able to include a mini cutting board, a pouch full of threads and a glue stick, plus the material covered diamonds which are ready to sew and quite a few which have already been sewn.

And yes, the diamonds are pretty small - they’re about two inches in length. I bought the white templates from eBay as my patience doesn’t extend to cutting those too!

The blues I’m using are all from MOH’s old shirts and the lime green is from my stash. I like the colours together and have been playing with layouts, even though it’s early days - I’ve only eighteen completed, and I’m going to need quite a few more.

Through testing the layouts I realised i liked it when there’s a plain blue ‘star’ interspersed with the patterned ‘stars’ like in the image below.

And to mock up how the gaps could be filled I’ve used the white diamond templates. These will be a large diamond, not four as shown in this image, and that’s where the new-to-me vintage table cloth will come it, not that I’ve been brave enough to cut it yet. I’m biding my time and will switch to that when I’m fed up of the lime blue diamonds.

Clearly lime blue isn’t a colour, but it’s the working name for my quilt as that’s what I see - and it’s stuck. Once it’s all together, and I’m not sure how big I’m aiming for, then we’ll see if the name still works. I’m also thinking that I might add further adornments, perhaps buttons, perhaps beads but that’s a decision for another day.

I’ll update you again when there’s more than just my lime blue diamonds, which may not be for a while!

Hidden Depths by AitchBee at the Newark Quilt Show

The quilts I’m sharing today from this year’s Newark Quilt Show include the maker’s love of typefaces and letter forms, as well of their fondness for 3D imagery. It won’t be a surprise that AitchBee trained as a graphic designer, but now thinks of themselves as one who works in cloth, enjoying the precise imagery that comes with foundation paper piecing (FPP), which is something I’ve not tried myself yet.

All of the quilts are amazing, and one is my all time favourite from this year’s show. I like its cleverness and spent a fair while looking at it, before I really saw it - and then looking at it through my phone’s camera lens made it so much easier to see, and then you wonder why you never saw it before.

The quilt is called Negative Space, which again is clever and did more than raise a smile.

NEGATIVE SPACE

I’m not sure how well it translates on a screen, so read down each column of letters and hopefully you’ll get it - if not, think of the quilt’s name, and then it should materialise. And of course, then you’ll realise that there isn’t any negative space at all!

It’s subtle, beautiful and yes, I’d happily have this one anywhere in my house.

But there were more quilts too, the one below at first you see the cubes, then you look more deeply - and the more you look, the more you see.

NEW PERSPECTIVES

Those small blocks are 1 1/2 versions - now that’s small, and no doubt fiddly.

I’m also a fan of how these are quilted, with multiple vertical lines and it’s something that I hope to replicate on my Essex Linen kisses quilt, but there’s a way to go on that yet though!

OCEAN STAR MIDNIGHT

I love the colours on this one, and it includes FPP blocks ranging from 1 inch to 16 inches across so that’s a good reminder that not all blocks need to be the same size, though of course that makes it a lot easier.

The final quilt I’m sharing from AitchBee is full of colour, and couldn’t be further from the first one in this post colour-wise, but it’s an expansion on that, and includes the whole alphabet.

BLOCK CAPS

This one is an expansion on the Negative Space quilt, and includes the whole alphabet. It was interesting to read that they got stuck on the letter ‘B’ needing to enlist help with it, and a lot of coffee and cake before it looked right. Reassuring too, as it’s good to hear that even quilts which end up looking up as good as this aren’t always plain sailing.

So much inspiration here, and in a completely different way to the other quilts I’ve shared from the show. It almost makes me want to try Foundation Paper Piecing, but I know I really shouldn’t add more to my list, well just yet anyway!

Making my mystery block of the month: February

You’ll have seen that I plan to complete Sherri’s mystery block a month quilt and earlier this week I shared the test blocks which I made into my fourth charity quilt, and today I’m sharing the vintage star block I made for my own quilt.

I’ve chosen the three fabrics with navy backgrounds for my block, and a more densely patterned pale background fabric. Thankfully I remembered my learnings from the test blocks, despite my hesitation to get going with my own block.

I wasn’t sure how this one would go, as I shared in the earlier post that matching the seams on my test blocks had been, well variable. And it’s a great block, but I didn’t find it as enjoyable to make this one, but - spoiler alert - it turned out pretty well and I think it’s probably the best version I’ve done.

Phew. And isn’t that often the way?!

Adding the borders

For this block I’ve used the same fabrics for my borders as for my January block, but I’ve reversed their placement so when the quilt is assembled the greens are together. I suspect that I might need to make some adjustments to the planned layout at some point so that my quilt is wider than it’s long, as I already know that I want to use this on a double bed. It may mean that I make extra blocks at the end of the year, but there’s plenty of time to work that out.

Doesn’t it look great?

I’m really pleased with how it turned out, and like the patterned star against the light background.

And I was even more pleased when I placed it alongside January’s block of the month. I think that when it’s done the quilt is going to be pretty special.

Join me next month to see how I get on with the next mystery block, and check out my posts which contain charity quilts made from the test blocks.