Star Blocks Done

I finished sewing together the star blocks. They took a few unexpected turns along the way. I had chosen a deep blue-violet for one of the backgrounds. I liked how it stood out a little from the striped background, since I hadn't used that color for the stripes. I decided to make two of the blocks with the blue-violet.

I needed to choose another background for the other two stars. Navy and black were logical. The black really popped, and the navy seemed a little dull. I started rummaging through my sacks for other possibilities and saw purple. Hmmm. That would be interesting. I don't have any purple in the quilt, but it's a neighbor of blue. I found a couple of other purples and auditioned them. I chose a nice deep purple, which looked good against the striped background, as well as with the yellow and reds. I didn't have enough of the purple in my sacks for two blocks, but I was pretty sure it was the same as in Cathy's Southwest. Sure enough, it was. So I sliced off a 2.5" strip. There's plenty left for the Southwest, and I'm sure it won't hurt.

I sliced and diced the blue-violet and the purple into 2.5" squares, I used those squares as base blocks, as I began to sew scrappy yellow triangles in varying angles, heighths and widths to give the points a wonky look.

With the points all sewn, I laid the stars out on the striped background, surrounding the red centers.

Stars laid out, but not sewn together yet

Before I could assemble the star blocks, I needed to make a decision about the reds. Do I want to use both of them or just one? Earlier I had decided to use the gold-flecked red for the blue-violet, and the hand-dyed red for the purple. I cut one of the gold-flecked scraps into two 2.5" squares and laid them over the hand-dyed centers. I liked the look. Two purple blocks provided enough variety, and I liked the consistency of the gold fleck in all of the blocks.

So it was off to the races. I sewed one blue-violet star and one purple star. They were so cute. I had to cut another gold-fleck scrap to finish the other two stars. I was trimming and cutting, when it happened. I cut the piece an inch short! Grrrrrr! How to fix it...let's see. I could piece it together. Maybe I had another scrap somewhere. I searched for the next few minutes in vain. Okay, I guess I'll just have to piece it and live with the seam in one of the star centers. That wasn't going to help. The scrap had started at just over 5" long. Any seam, no matter how small, was going to leave me short. Double Grrrrrr!

I had to accept defeat on the gold fleck for all of the stars. Next I had to decide whether to use the hand-dyed for both remaining stars or use it for just one oddball. I decided to go with the oddball option, giving it to the purple based on my overall quilt layout. Oh, well...The quilt will still be beautiful.

Star blocks assembled