Take a tour along Lavender Roads with these unusual quilt blocks.

- For the blooming block.

You could use a ruler, you could foundation piece, or you could try a new technique that's somewhere in between.

The unique lattice block also features fun construction and we play with alternate layouts.

Breathe in the lavender scented inspiration on today's episode of “Love of Quilting.” Funding for “Love of Quilting” is provided by.

The Bernina 990.

If it can be imagined, it can be created.

APQS.

Longarm quilting machines allow you to express your creativity.

APQS.

Quilt forever.

Electric quilt making every quilt a designer since 1991.

[Upbeat music] Hi there.

Welcome to the 48th season of “Love of Quilting.” I'm Sara Gallegos.

And I'm Angela Huffman.

Angela, you have just an explosion of florals here.

Of color right?

- Yeah.

Yes.

Rich purple and rich yellow together.

Don't you love that color combination?

- It's Gorgeous.

Yeah, this.

Is Lavender Rhodes.

And it kind of reminds me I was a an exchange student in high school in the south of France.

Oh interesting.

- And I had only seen in the in Kentucky the fields of tobacco and corn.

So just green, green, green, good and green.

- Okay.

And then I went to the south of France, and it was it was lavender in the fields, and it was sunflowers in the fields.

It was these colors on the fields I had never seen before.

Oh so pretty.

- And I just had this vivid memory of being driven across the countryside and seeing, just like it felt like I was just on a whole other planet.

- Neat.

And that inspired this palette.

- Yeah, and that inspired this.

So lavender Rhodes.

Two blocks.

One is a star block, that has this interesting kind of kite, shape here in the four corners.

And then this lattice block is doing a lot of hard work to carry the eye through the quilt.

Diagonally.

So we're going to start with how to do this star quilt.

The star block.

First.

And so the first thing we're going to do is that that kite shape and there's there's a number of ways to do this, unit.

You can use a specialty ruler.

You can use traditional paper piecing.

We're going to do paper piecing, but we're going to use freezer paper.

- Okay.

Because one of the things a lot of people get annoyed with when it comes to, paper piecing is just pulling all that paper out.

Having to tear all that away.

- Right.

It's a whole other job, right?

- Right.

It's a whole other job.

- And messy.

- And messy.

Yeah.

So what I've got is I have a piece of freezer paper that I have traced the shape, the, pattern onto, and then I've gone ahead and pre scored.

So I've, I've folded it on the lines so that it is pre scored.

So I have the stitching lines, I have the outline of the block.

And then of course this is cut with that additional quarter inch seam built into it.

- Okay.

So what we're going to do is I've got my rich yellow here and I'm just going to place it down.

Actually I see that pretty little butterfly.

- Right.

See if I can hit that butterfly inside the middle there and kind of aim for it.

And then the freezer paper, it has a wax coating on one side.

And we're just going to, hit it with a iron and that will melt that wax and it'll adhere it to the fabric.

And then I'm just going to peel back one side.

So instead of gluing it in place like you might a paper piecing template, you're just going to fuse it and then it's repositionable.

You could reuse the template again right?

Exactly.

Over and over and over again.

- Over and over.

So if you have a big project and you don't want to deal with pulling all that paper out of the end, using freezer paper is such a good way to do it.

So I'm going to cut a quarter inch away, and that'll give me that quarter inch seam on our yellow.

And then I'm going to place the next color, which is the, the kind of purpley color.

Right sides together where I have those edges aligned.

And I know that I have enough purple fabric because I've got this bent back and it will cover all of that purple so that I know it's there.

So really it's covering this whole entire piece.

So you know you've got lots left.

- Right.

And what you're going to do, Sara, is you're going to just sew just to the edge of that freezer paper.

- Okay.

Not on the freezer paper, but just to the edge of the freezer paper.

So this is where we travel away from traditional paper piecing, because we're not actually stitching through the paper.

Right.

- Just right beside.

Okay.

And so you can reuse as if you've got a big project.

I find you can probably get about 16 uses out of that, freezer paper before it starts to lose the wax.

And you're going to have to.

- Okay.

Get another piece out.

- That's pretty good.

And I'm just using freezer paper from the grocery store like, nothing, Nothing fancy.

- Nothing fancy.

- Okay, so there we are.

And we're going to just pull that freezer paper back over.

And before I cut, I'm just going to double check.

And I can see that I have enough all the way around.

And then I'm going to go ahead and adhere that, you know, melt that wax so that it kind of grips onto that fabric that we just did.

So there's the one side, So now I'm going to fold this side back.

And pre scoring it does really help I'm going to trim that yellow away.

And the only reason I'm trimming the yellow away right now is that it just helps me align the purple a little bit more easily than kind of guessing where that purple should go.

Gives you a nice straight edge, which helps quilter brain, right?

- It does.

So I've got it all lined up, and when I have it folded back, it's certainly going to cover that, whole piece of the purple.

If you have, a light box or something.

You can also use that to just double check yourself.

If you don't have a light box, you could also, I've had friends who have a glass table top.

A coffee table.

- Sure.

- And they'll put A light under the coffee table.

- Under the bottom.

And now they've got this light, this light box, even a window with on the sun behind it would also do the trick.

A little bit of waste with paper piecing, but great place to use up for scraps.

Do a little scrap quilt, right?

And, paper piecing will give you some shapes that are really hard to get, with traditional piecing.

And any time I try to be a little thrifty with my fabric and cut it closer to the right size.

It will bite you.

Yeah.

- Exactly.

I always end up kind of regretting the choice Yeah.

- Because I don't have quite enough there.

So I did get that little.

I think when we trim it, I'm going to have that - Cute.

that little, - Very cute.

Butterfly right where I want him.

So I'm going to go ahead and just cut this to size.

Now I'm not cutting it to the four inch sides.

I need this to be 4.5in.

So I'm just using the outside portion of that pattern as the cut line to trim this down.

Alright.

We got one more side to go.

You you you save all those little scraps huh?

I don't but I know people who do.

- Yeah.

Have you ever done a crumb quilt?

I have not.

- A crumb block where you use all those little crumbs.

I have not, but there's a really cool jar behind this on set here that has all those little crumbs in i Yeah it does.

That's true.

- Just pretty decoration.

All right, so let's peel off our paper.

So now it's ready to use again.

- Excellent.

And there's our little cutie patootie.

And it's perfectly precise.

- With the little.

Yeah.

So you're going to need four of those.

- Okay.

And the next thing we're going to do is we're going to create this hourglass unit.

And the hourglass unit.

It has two little pink guys a neutral and then that, royal purpley color.

And so the way to get this done is you are going to need, to put the neutral against the pink.

Okay.

And mark from corner to corner.

And then sew on each side of the diagonal, which I've already done.

You're also going to need that royal purple up against that same pinky pink, mark corner to corner.

Sew a quarter inch away from each side.

And that is going to give you some half square triangles.

So let's go ahead and we'll cut right on that diagonal.

Right on that drawn line is a little hard to see because I did use thread that blended.

But.

- We'll get the idea.

You'll get the idea.

- In the next step.

- Yeah.

- Yeah.

So we've got now there is a half square and there's a half square.

So I'm going to go ahead and I'm going to iron these, I'm going to iron these away from the pink.

And so the direction that you press these seams is going to be, helpful because that will allow it to nest.

And I'm pretty sure I've got it.

I think.

Yeah.

If you go both away from the pink.

Both away for the pink.

- You'll be good.

Yeah, that should do it.

And of course, these are going to be a little raggedy jaggedy, but I won't trim everything down until the next step.

Okay.

Okay.

So there's I'll put these over here because we're done with those.

And then we're going to just lay this down, so that they are running perpendicular to each other.

Oh wait.

Sorry.

This way.

So because we're going to sew perpendicular to the right.

So we're going to nest these together.

And I'm just going to use my fingers to kind of feel where that seam drops into itself.

That feels pretty good.

All right.

And then I'm just going to draw a line here corner to corner.

And then you'll be sewing a quarter inch away from that drawn line.

And I'm I'm using a heat away pen here so it won't wind up in the final quilt.

I would just caution you, if you use heat away pens, don't put them on any portion of the fabric that will be seen from the front of the fabric.

Because if the quilt gets cold, all of those marks come right back out.

So if you ever, like, were to ship it somewhere, all of those marks.

- Take it on an airplane.

Yeah, all those marks would come right back out.

I did a really cute embroidered bench pillow.

You know I live in Michigan.

- Yeah.

and it was like a winter themed one.

So then when it sits near the front door and the door opens and closes, my markings come back.

- Yeah.

There you go.

- It's kind of funny.

Then we know it's really cold out.

You can tell by the bench pillow.

There you go.

All right, so then we're just going to cut on that drawn line.

You could use scissors for this or a rotary cutter.

And then when we open this up there's the unit.

- Ta-da.

Now I do want to because there's so much going on in this seam here.

Let's let's spin the seam.

- Okay.

So a spun seam will just allow that fabric to lay down flatter.

So this was the line of stitching we just did.

And here's the previous line of stitching.

So what I'm interested in taking out is in they're little tiny.

There's just like three of them just above the line that I just did.

And so if you kind of put your fingernail into the flaps of the seam and then give it a little twist, it'll pop those, little stitches out that are above the line that you just that you just stitched.

And then when you open this up, it will fall down flat.

And that little seam, that little pressed seam makes a little cute four patch there will just help everything fall nice and flat.

And this is going to help your accuracy.

It's really going to help you If you are a machine quilter, - Right.

it's going to help with that machine quilting process to get everything to lay down nice and flat.

Even if you're stitching in the ditch, it'll really help to keep that needle from sliding to the side when you get to that intersection.

- Yeah.

So, we're going to trim these, to four and a half, and I've got this ruler that has a nice strong diagonal that I'm going to put on that diagonal seam.

And it also has a diagonal going this way.

So it doesn't have any information.

I don't need only the information that I do need.

You can see that there's a little bit of excess on the outside of the ruler, and there's a little bit of excess outside that 4.5in.

mark.

So I'm going to get a perfect little square.

Oh, he did move on me ever so slightly.

If you ever have a ruler that moves like that, then, I would put there's all kinds of things you can put on it, like.

Grippy tape.

Grippy tape, some clear vinyl.

But having it move on you is going to be not your friend.

- Becomes problematic.

Yeah.

So I've got again I just rotated it, 90 degrees.

And then I put that diagonal on that seam and I've got my four and a half mark on the outside.

So I just have a little clean up cut on those last two edges.

And I will have this at the right size for the star.

I very often when I cut things out for quilts that have a lot of hourglass units like this, or even just half square triangles, will just size up my cuts, you know, an eighth or a quarter of an inch just to give myself a little extra to trim down, because I feel like I always have a more precise result in the end than if I trust the math.

And my quarter inch is always perfect.

Well, and it just makes me relax a little bit more so I don't feel like, you know, there's pressure to be - Sure.

- to hit it right on.

You want to put those two those corner squares down.

And here we go.

- Do I have that.

Is it that one?

- There.

Is the center.

Yeah okay.

So there's the star.

- Nice.

And so let's see.

- Our kites are Oh facing the wrong direction.

- Oh perfect.

You know wouldn't that be cool?

- That's a whole other block.

It's a whole other block.

- It's pretty.

Yeah.

- I like that.

- Yeah.

Okay.

Good.

All right.

- Cute.

Yeah.

It's always nice to have it sitting beside you, your pattern sitting beside you.

Okay, so we would put these together just like you normally would.

We're going to put these two units together to create that row.

We'll put these two units on the center to create that row and these two here.

And then you'll put your rows together.

In you'll - Very nice.

have your star your star block.

- That's very pretty.

So let's talk about the lattice block.

- Okay.

Because the lattice block goes together in a way that's kind of cool.

That I think I think you'll enjoy.

All right.

So there's our star, and the lattice block is giving that diagonal movement through the quilt that I just love.

So the first thing you're going to do with the, with the lattice block is you need to build a strip set.

And the strip set is not the strips aren't equal.

Oh okay.

So typically you're - Interesting.

going to have the same size strips.

Sure.

- And notice that these two are much larger.

Oh because of your flippy corners.

That's right, that's right.

-Nice.

So I'm going to cut I cut a two inch, swath out of this strip set.

So this is what we're going to use, to travel through that deep purple.

So that's a two inch piece.

And then I've got a 6.5in, piece of this dark purple, and I'm just going to go ahead and you're going to just cut it down that diagonal to get yourself two triangles.

And then what I want to do is I want to find the center of this triangle.

Okay.

So I'm going to just fold it over and finger press.

You want to do that one.

And finger press.

And that'll find the center of the setting triangle.

It's not really a setting triangle, but it kind of sort of is.

Sort of behaves like one.

- Yeah.

And then I want to align that finger press with that middle seam of the strip set.

So it is going to kind of flop off on the end here.

And that is deliberate.

And do you have a little pin.

I'm just going to put one right here so it stays put.

There you go.

Thank you.

So it looks a little funny.

But we're going to trust the process.

We're going to trust the process.

All right.

So a quarter inch seam there.

Okay.

- And we've already got the the finger press in the middle here.

Yank that pin out before I get to it.

Yeah.

- There we go.

Never a good idea to sew over a pin.

Definitely hurts the machine and the needle.

Okay.

There we go.

Alright.

And then we're going to press that.

And I would press this towards the, royal purple.

It's it's the way the fabric is going to want to go anyway, just because there aren't any seams in that royal purple.

Do be a little gentle with these, long areas of the triangle, because that's all bias.

Right.

So bias is stretchier than cross grain.

And I'm going to put that finger press right on that seam and put a little pin here and have you go down there.

Okay.

This is a fun little unit.

You don't see this very often.

I've forgotten where I saw this unit.

I, I tend to go through some of the, websites of quilt museums and antique quilts and kind of look at vintage blocks and see what who I think is working hard, what kind of blocks I think are working hard.

And then try to figure out how to kind of make those blocks in a new kind of contemporary vibe.

Sure.

And so this was one of those that I found somewhere that I just thought, man, this would be a great little anchor block to, against a strong star.

It's a great source for inspiration.

It really is.

Just looking at those vintage quilts or like you said, going to the quilt museums and any old book I can find of old blocks is just so much fun for me.

So I've got too much on the outside here, right?

This is not the size it should be.

So what I want to do is I want to just square this up.

So I'm going to lay my, ruler on that corner, and I'm going to just square that up.

All right.

There's one side.

- Okay.

and I'm going to square this side up.

And just aligning with as much on my ruler as I possibly can.

And that is going to give me this unit.

All right.

The next thing we want to do is we want to put flippy corners on them.

And so you can see here these this unit.

So this is this unit right.

- Sure.

Has dark pink flippy corners.

And this unit has a dark pink here and a light pink here.

So we get another little hourglass.

So just pay attention.

So what we're going to do is we're going to do, this this unit with the light pink here in the dark pink here.

And I'm going to mark these on the diagonal.

And you're going to sew on that diagonal.

Okay.

There you go.

And while you sew that I'm going to mark this one.

So just think about as you're kind of attacking this how to keep yourself organized that you do have the correct number that has the light pink and the dark pink as opposed to dark pink on both sides.

What I do is I sort them kind of like I'm sorting cards.

Sure.

- To keep myself straight.

Okay, I'm going to stitch this one.

Now, while you're doing that, I want to talk about the outside border ish.

It's a very skinny strip, and it just has the two hot pinks, flippy corners on them.

And I did that because I get a little annoyed when I see quilts that.

They don't like complete the sentence.

So they don't have, like the final unit that the sashing or the lattice block is making.

The point to a star or something.

So it's just got this little tiny, excess sashing that goes all around the outside.

So we will.

- So there you have that.

- There you go.

Love it.

Yeah, yeah.

So you'll need four of those and that will make the lattice block.

Now as we saw when we were playing with the star block, like the way that you rotate those kite units could give you a whole different look.

So I want to get out the computer, and I want to kind of show you how I decided how to design this quilt and how I decided what blocks to use.

I look forward to seeing it.

Yeah.

It's so much fun for us to get a little glimpse into your thought process when you're designing these.

You can certainly design on graph paper.

I like to use a computer just because it kind of goes a little faster for me.

- Sure.

And I typically design like we said kind of earlier in the season.

I typically design in like a gray and black and monochrome and then put the fabric on it.

Now we were playing with that star black and we kind of had those kite shapes, rotated in the opposite way.

- Flipped around.

So I just, I kind of drew that up here just to show you what that would do to the quilt.

So it change it.

- Oh that's fun.

- It's still kind of cool.

It is.

- The thing I don't particularly like is how it intersects with that outside border.

It doesn't put that little, you know, it's like a little bow at the end of it.

- Sure.

So I'm going to take that away.

But I wanted to show you how easy it was to audition other, lattice kind of blocks.

So, I've got one here, and let's just lay it in every other block and it gets a really strong kind of woven look to it.

That's interesting to me, but there's a lot like you remember that's a 12 inch block.

There's a lot of neutral there to fill.

- Yeah.

So that might be a little too stark.

So if I go to a different block to audition that design.

So that one is also kind of interesting to me.

I just don't think that it overlaps with the neighbor star blocks very well.

I don't think that it's a good partner.

They don't make as much sense together.

- It does not.

You could go with a more traditional kind of movement through the block.

And that's also interesting.

But again, is the scale is a little off.

- Sure.

I feel like those, squares are a little bit too big.

I want the star to be the star.

- Right.

So I don't think that that's a good choice.

I have some other ones here to show you.

I thought this one might be a little bit, fun to drop in.

Oh that's kind of neat.

I like that.

So that actually works.

Pretty cool.

That's really fun.

Now, take a look at that super outside border that I have that little skinny sashing.

I would have to redesign that because that doesn't quite work with this block very well.

- Right.

But super interesting look.

And then, there's another one in here that I really kind of like.

So there's a whole bunch of different blocks to choose from.

Let's pick this one and drop it in.

I kind of dig that.

- It's a lot going on.

It's pretty though.

It's a lot going on.

But the scale is right.

I will say that that outside border I again, I probably a plain border at this point would be a good idea.

But let's also, and let's do that.

We'll just put a plain border on here.

So I'm just going to make this a, corner block will be fine.

So I'm going to drop in that, that purpley color.

Just pick that up and drop it into that outside border.

That's pretty.

Now I am a huge fan of chunky sashing.

Right?

So I love a sashing that's big.

That does a lot of hard work and kind of adds a secondary design.

So let's give ourselves a little bit of room, for a sashing.

And so I'm just going to go in and I'm going to make my sashing here.

Let's make it like a four inch, sashing.

So I've got a lot of room there for my sashing designs, and I've got a couple here pulled in to kind of show you to pick it up.

So I designed this one.

And I need to rotate these.

And so that chunky sashing - Oh that's neat.

has an hourglass that repeats the hourglass from the star, and it kind of expands the star into the neighboring areas.

And anytime I can obscure the grids so that you can't see block, block, block, block, that's where my heart starts to sing.

- Yeah.

So to make it kind of expand into the neighbor love, love, love that.

I do not like the stark white in here.

So I would go in and probably just pick up that, floral neutral print and then drop it into all of those, cornerstones.

I think that is lovely.

- It looks like fireworks to me.

Those yellow bright stars.

It does, it does.

And so let's actually, let's go in and let's make this now like a six inch, because I want to show you, you could like when we talk about super chunky borders or sashing, this one is a six inch, sashing now.

And I'm going to rotate those.

So it's, it would be, a split rec Split rectangle with two, flying geese.

And that starts to spin things in a kind of an interesting way.

And I would start to play them with those secondary blocks.

Now you got to be careful because you got to be committed to how much piecing this would be, right?

- Right.

But any time you can play with those thick sashing and then start to think about your borders, how do you piece those borders and extend the voice out to the edges of the quilt too.

Just play with some different blocks and borders, and see what you can come up with?

It's a lot of fun.

It's a lot of fun.

Grab a pencil, tips and other useful information.

Coming up next.

Okay, guess what?

We got a card.

Oh we did.

We did Bess Garibay of Fairport, New York.

Said dear Sara and Angela, I just love your show.

When your show airs at 7 a.m., I have my morning coffee while I watch.

You are my coffee buddies.

I quilt and I also love scrapbooking.

So naturally I use my scraps to embellish everything from greeting cards Look at that.

- Isn't that beautiful.

to thread and scrap bags to take to quilting retreat.

Yeah.

- Isn't that gorgeous?

- That is so nice.

I love your show.

We love you.

- That's so nice.

That's amazing.

And this is a scrap bag to put on the table for a quilt retreat.

- Oh perfect.

Why not make it pretty?

Yeah, perfect.

Thank you.

- Aw thank you.

Well, this one.

I love the look of the little sloth.

Look at him.

Is a.

- Cute.

- Cute kitty.

Yeah.

This is, from Linda Leland from Rapid City, South Dakota.

She says after using fusible or basting products, I find some of my pins are not as smooth as I'd like.

This little scrap cushion is filled with steel wool.

Press a little as you pull the pins in and out.

Get this, she says.

I set reminders on my phone so I never miss a show.

Thanks for the inspiration.

That's great.

- That is.

- This is great.

Yeah, it keeps your pins nice and sharp.

- Right?

So cute.

Just don't put it in his eye because that would be.

That would be inappropriate.

Yes.

- Yeah.

- Okay.

How about this little pincushion party.

So this is Mary Lou Berg of Billings, Montana, and she says, I love your show.

Now that I'm getting older, my hands are stiff and I'm unable to pick up pins as easily.

So this is her solution.

Isn't that cute?

- Oh yeah.

She just like, glued paper onto the ends of the pin so she can grab them easily.

- And it's festive as well.

And it's fun.

Thanks so much for sending your ideas and we just love to see them!

- Yeah.

- We'll, see you next time.

- We'll see you next time.

Please share your good ideas and quilting tips.

Send them to the address on your screen.

Additional quilting ideas are available in the pages of Fons and Porter's Love of Quilting magazine.

In addition to the magazine, you will receive all 13 shows from this series in digital video format.

The cost is $49.95.

Explore loveofquilting.com/LOQtv Find out more about this episode.

Discover ways to watch the show, explore patterns, find supply lists, and browse earlier seasons.

Explore loveofquilting.com/LOQtv and connect with us on Facebook and Instagram.

Funding for Love of Quilting is provided by.

The Bernina 990.

If it can be imagined, it can be created.

APQS.

Longarm quilting machines allow you to express your creativity.

APQS.

Quilt forever.

Electric quilt making every quilt a designer since 1991.

[Upbeat music]