Farmer's Wife QAL Blocks 23 and 24: Charlotte and Coral

Week 11 and a couple of lovely and straightforward blocks in the  Farmer's Wife 1930s Quilt Along.   Block 23 is Charlotte, (p. 182, letter 182) and from when I first saw this I thought the boat shapes in each half of the block would appeal to Jessie and sure enough, she chose this one to guest post: read all about it here!   Here's my version, the boat shape reminded me of paper boats made from newspaper so I used a Jane Austen text print and I love how it looks.

Fabric credits:
Riley Blake Ardently Austen- Text Black
Penny Rose Fabrics Hope Chest Blossom Yellow
Penny Rose Fabrics Hope Chest Blossom Teal

For block 24, Coral (p. 183, letter p. 138) I strayed from my usual construction methods to try out rotary cutting and piecing.  There are rotary cutting instructions for all the shapes in this block.  I did this partly because, when placed on point, this block is no longer symmetrical vertically and horizontally which means the foundation paper pattern pieces will give me a reverse or mirror image block because they haven't been reversed for the CD.  I also wanted to see how accurate I could be!

Fabric credits:
Riley Blake Fancy and Fabulous, Breath in coral
Windham, Heather Ross Tiger Lily Cat Grid in green

I'll show you what I mean about the symmetry.  Looking at the block square on, there is vertical symmetry, although not horizontal symmetry because of the little window shape.   If you want a square on block for your final quilt, foundation paper piecing block that will work fine.

Now the small block on point.  I've added a horizontal line to this one and you can see it is not symmetrical, it wouldn't be with a vertical line either!

If you do chose to foundation paper piece this block, you can use the rotary cutting instructions and just make your pieces bigger- ½" bigger is a good amount for me.   For rotary cutting, my top tips are:

Top piecing tips for this block:

• Chain piece where you can
• ensure scant ¼" seams throughout.  It doesn't hurt to test your seam allowances and see if they measure up.
• Press seams to one side and nest them where you can
• When joining the half-square triangles together,  dab little light fabric glue to hold them together rather than pins-  this keeps the bias edges undisturbed.  You can see the dabs in the picture.  Dragging the glue stick across the diagonal edge will distort the triangle.

The letter for this block has a timeless message to enjoy your children whilst they are still at home with you, something I am constantly reminded of with my daughter, currently in her last year at high school.

Remember you can:

• Use the hashtags  Don't forget to use #fw1930sqal on Instagram and the Flickr group if you like to share there.  
• For individual blocks, you can use #charlotteblock and #coralblock on Instagram. are using these hash tags, #fw23charlotte,  #fw24coral, I'm using both hashtag systems.
• You can also copy and paste links to any blog posts you do on these blocks in the comments and I'd love to visit and take a look. 
• Watch and join in on Periscope.  I'll be talking about fabrics and piecing accuracy on periscope.tv/@verykb at 2.30pm GMT today.   There's a lovely regular crowd who join me each Monday so please feel welcome to add to it!  It will be available for 24 hours to replay before it disappears! Link will be in my twitter feed @verykb and I'll post on Instagram and twitter about 15 minutes before it goes out.  

Please note:  I have linked to my sponsors on items bought through them and elsewhere for anything that has come from other shops.

You can join the quilt-along at any time, all the posts are here for you to catch up with.  Back next Monday with Jo Avery from My Bear Paw and blocks 25 and 26- they are a bit tougher next week although not as bad as the next week!  Have a peep at your book and you'll see what I mean...