Sew Along Quilt Update

I am back from Colorado and I have lots of makes to show but I'm being a lazy blogger and all I want to do is sew this quilt.  I don't love quilting, it's such a daunting task.  But I love how it is turning out I just want to get it done.  

As you may have imagined I didn't get a whole lot of sewing done in CO, too many other fun distractions. But I did get all my strips cut out, which is a huge deal.  I decided to sew up my queen size quilt  similar to this one by Anna of Noodlehead's .  I'll put the herringbone blocks in the center and then 2 other fabrics on the sides.  I figure I need 35 blocks, way less work than the 49 I was thinking I needed before.  I added a few more fabrics too.

 I've made 10 blocks now!  Woohoo!

 I had some trouble with the template lining up the way it was supposed to so I came up with an alternative method to get the same results. If you are doing the sew along and are having the same problem here's what I did.  

The original instructions are to align the left corner of the ruler/template with the intersection of the edge of strips 2 and 3.  Then align the right corner of the ruler with the edge of strip 1.  

photo from Bijou Lovely

I was having a hard time getting the corner of my template and 2^nd seam to line up so that I didn’t have any holes along the left side of my block. 

 I decided to float the template around until it fit inside the material.  To keep my blocks consistent I made sure to always line up my template at a 45 degree angle.  There are two ways to do this. You can line up one  side along a grid line, and align your template on a 45 degree angle using you ruler to match the 45 degree marking on your grid.

 Another way to do it is to place one side of your sewn strips along the 45 degree marking on your grid and line up your template with the inch lines on grid using your ruler as a reference. 

Consequently, this method makes your block match up like chevrons from left to right.  But they still will not match up as perfect chevrons vertically.  One benefit of this method is that the wasted corners are cut at a 45 degree angle so they sew up into nice squares and they can be made into all kinds of cute things. I plan on sewing them into the back. 

Okay back to reality, It's almost time to get the rest of the kids from school.