Farmer's Wife 1930s Quilt Along Blocks 91 and 92 Sarah and Sonnie

Time for blocks 92 and 93, Sarah and Sonnie in the Farmer's Wife 1930s QAL.  I've had sore hands this week so I've been looking for shortcuts and for Sarah (p.250, letter p.78) I rotary pieced the whole block rather than foundation paper piecing.  If you want any help calculating flying geese or with different half-square triangle methods, you can refer to my Making a Quilt series for Sewing Directory.   Justine returns for her last guest post and you can read her thoughts on this block, and the quilt along here.

Fabric Credits
Kona Citrus
Riley Blake Fancy and Fabulous, Breath in mint
Heather Ross for Windham, Tiger Lily Roses in Blush

I managed to rotary piece part of the next block, Sonnie, (p.251, letter p139) whilst foundation piecing the rest, details below.   There is a brief letter for this block but a sweet one none these, the expression "her sands have run" about the woman's mother  having died is so evocative.

Fabric Credits

Riley Blake Ardently Austen (the white/black colour way is sold out)
Lori Holt for Riley Blake Flower Patch, Flower Berries in Orange 
Green daisy dotty- gift from a friend

{For both blocks, I link to sponsor shops for fabric bought from them and elsewhere for other fabrics}

Strip piecing
It is possible to  make the centre square of this block as a mini nine-patch.  I measured the squares from the foundation pattern piecing; they are not a regular measurement I had to cut scant but it worked.  I did the same for the rectangle blocks, you do need to be quite precise but it worked well for me.

Rotary Cutting 

These are for foundation piecing so are cut larger than needed.  Quantities given are for foundation piecing the whole block  but you can try the nine patch and strip piecing method above for some parts of the sections.

• Mint Small half-square triangles (block corners) : cut (2) 2 ⅛" squares, subcut each square in half diagonally to yield 4 HSTs
• Mint large quarter-square triangles (block corners) : cut (3) 3 ½" squares, subcut each square along both diagonals to yield 12 QSTs in total
• Mint small squares: cut (4) 1 ⅛" squares
• Mint rectangles: cut (4) 1 ⅛"  x 2 ⅛" rectangles
• Orange large quarter-square triangles (block corners) : cut (1) 3 ½" squares, subcut each square along both diagonals to yield 4 QSTs in total
• Orange large squares: cut (4) 2 ⅛" squares
• Orange small squares: cut (1) 1 ⅛" squares
• White small squares: cut (4) 1 ⅛" squares
• White rectangles: cut (8) 1 ⅛"  x 2 ⅛" rectangles

Top Tips for Foundation Piecing this Block

• Pre cut all pieces
• Use a water based glue stick e.g. Sewline, to stick the first piece of fabric on each section
• Chain piece where possible
• Use an index card or a Dritz seam guide to fold the paper back when trimming excess

Here are two new nine-patch blocks for  my collection,  I'm making an equal number of each gingham colour  so I was balancing out the jade/turquoise this week.  There are 24  in total and I'll start working out how many I need for the quilt I have planned in my head.

• You can share your farmer's wife quilt blocks with the hashtags #fw1930sqal and for these blocks either #Sarahblock or #Sonnieblock as well as #fw91Sarah, #fw92Sonnie
• If you want me to take a look at your blocks, tag me on Instagram, I'm @verykerryberry or comment here and paste in a link to your blog
• There's a Flickr group you can add to here.  All my Farmer's Wife 1930s blocks can be seen in this album and my 9-patch blocks in this album. 

Fiona is back for the final time as a guest blogger next Monday.  See you again next Monday x 

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