Free pattern - In a Whirl

Welcome to the  Free Tutorial - In a Whirl  Sewmiriam Blogpost !  

I thought that this week it would be nice to have a free tutorial. After making  several quilts with indigenous prints and contrasting solids , I found myself with a pile of scraps left over, too bright and cheery to leave looking lost, lonely and neglected. Looking through some traditional quilt block books I stumbled across the block called Whirlwind. 

This tutorial covers how to make the block easily from 2 1/2 inch strips of fabric . ( Got some of those? I thought so! )  I have also included a description of how I made my In a Whirl Quilt using these blocks, just in case you like it and want to make one too. 

Let's get started.  A 1/4 inch seam is used throughout. 

Step 1. Take two  width of fabric (WOF) strips that are 2 1/2 inches wide and join lengthways. I always keep the darkest fabric on the top. This is important for later steps. (In the quilt shown I chose patterned and plain fabric strips for most of my blocks. )

Step 2.  Take a ruler and rotary cutter and measure 4 1/2 inches across the joined fabric strip and cut a 4 1/2 "  x 4 1/2 " square, as shown below. Cut 4 of these .   ( handy information  - a WOF strip will yield 9 of these squares) 

                            

Note that I keep the dark fabric on the top at ALL times for cutting. 

Step 3.   Cut each of these squares diagonally in half as shown below.

Step 4.   Separate the pieces into 2 piles - one predominantly light and one predominantly dark,  as shown below.

 Step 5.  Arrange the light pile of triangles into the whilrwind formation and stitch together.

Step 6. Arrange the dark pile of triangles into the whirlwind formation and stitch together.

You end up with 2 finished blocks.  One has a light centre and one has a dark.

Important note - these blocks will not seam match exactly if you try to join them side by side so they they do need to have sashing separating them .


In my quilt design In a Whirl I gave the sashing a modern twist by using a variety of neutral tones .
I gathered together as many shades of cream, beige and taupe I had in my scraps ( not many as it turned out) and cut them into 2 inch strips.

I made the quilt block units by adding these 2 inch strips to the  right side of the whirl and them the base of the whirl so that the quilt block units looked like this

I made 49 of these units.

These units were arranged in a grid 7 x 7 for the In a Whirl Sewmiriam quilt.

I then added the remaining sashing pieces where they were needed - to the top of the whirls on the first row, and to the left hand of the whirls at the beginning of each row.

Next I stitched the units together in each row, and then I joined the rows together.

With the remaining scraps I cut a heap of 2 1/2 inch squares and joined them to make a border of 2 rows of these squares .

Following this is a 2 1/2 inch neutral border.

Last , but not least in a 5 1/2 inch border of  striped fabric to frame the quilt and bring all the colour and movement together nicely.

Final statistics.

In a Whirl  by Sewmiriam

Size - 68" x 68"

Backing Fabric - 4 yards ( 4 metres )

Wadding - Quilters Dream Cotton

Quilting - I knotted this quilt


























Binding - 6-7 cuts of 2 1/2 inch strips . ( I used left over strips)


Here is the back. I added a strip made up of orphan blocks and pieces.

Thank you for stopping by. In this crazy busy world a few minutes at the Sewmiriam blog is a safe haven. Here you can slow down, learn something new, be inspired and enjoy fabric that has been curated,  mixed and matched, cut up, stitched together and made into something totally unique and useful.

I really hope you have enjoyed this free tutorial!

Happy sewing, love Miriamx 

Australis -New Beginnings Part 3

 There is a real nip in the air today in Sydney. The autumnal tones of the Australis  quilt suit this weather to perfection. Welcome to Part 3 of this growing quilt series. Australis is now too big for me to photograph well, so get ready for a few giggles when you see the finished quilt top towards the end of this blogpost. Photographic perfection is not my forté. I tend to favour the "before the makeover" look. At least I am authentic.

Let's start by revisiting the Australis quilt in my previous posts. You can read about the creation of the quilt in the New Beginnings blogpost by clicking here  and the Australis - New Beginnings Part 2 blogpost by clicking here .

In my last blogpost the log cabin variation round had just been added.

I chose to next add another neutral 2 inch border to frame the log cabins. To upsize the scale of the next pattern round I decided to add a wonderful large scale flying geese round. I mixed up all the fabrics   and  used a Marti Mitchell ruler to cut  the flying geese triangles. There really is something easy and delightful about using a purpose built ruler when making a quilt.  The   corner squares were created by  putting 2 flying geese units together pointing away from each other. 

To make things easier for myself I cut out a whole stack of central and side triangle units and then mixed and matched them at my sewing machine. To ensure that the sides fitted perfectly I  added thin solid colour strips to the short edges of each side panel to frame the corner squares. 

Australis still needed to be balanced, so another neutral border was added but slightly wider this time  being 2 1/2 inch when finished.  To frame the quilt perfectly I decided that it needed a border of squares.  The square border consists of 2 rows of 2 inch finished squares. The first row is made from print fabrics  and the second row is made from  plain fabrics.

Ta Da!!!!   The Australis top is finished. Here it is complete with very fine "model hands." Thank you Evan and Cameron. Thank goodness I have a tall husband and son who both have  loads of patience and tolerance for my crazy crafting ways.

Australis is now patiently waiting to be professionally long-arm  quilted by my friend Jo-Ann Phillips of Quiltwise Quilting.

In the meantime I can play around with the elements of this quilt .

I like the idea of  large flying geese strips and log cabin elements framed in a contrasting colour.

It's always fun to play and free ourselves from the constraints of patterns. Blessed are the pattern breakers!

I hope you have been able to find some time for yourself to pause, reflect and create.

Happy sewing, love Miriamx