Catching Up On June Pt1: Another Quarter 2 Finish: Valor

I haven't blogged all month but you'll see from this and the next post that June was a busy quilting month for me.  First up:  UFO #2 for this quarter (and #4 for the year) is done!  Pat Sloan's Valor quilt is quilted and bound!

Edited to add:  The link to my original Quarter 2 Finish-A-Long List is here.

This one started back in 2011, the year we moved.  I first saw it in the Spring 2011 issue of Fabric Trends For Quilters (now Quilt Trends) magazine (when Mark Lipinski was still the Editorial Director).  I don't know what attracted me more: that it was a Pat Sloan design (of whom I'm a big fan) *OR* the Red,  White and Blue fabrics which I had been collecting because I'd been jonesing to make some Quilts Of Valor *OR* the Lemoyne stars (which gave me an excuse to invest in Deb Tucker's tool) *OR* that it came in a kit which (as always) I was suckered persuaded into believing that would mean a fast turnaround for the quilt *OR* the "dream" that I could have a new quilt to display in our house for the patriotic holidays.

Probably all of the above was enough to make me ignore unpacking boxes that year and rushing to buy the kit and few additional pieces from the "Tribute" fabric line which Pat had designed for P&B Textiles and had been newly introduced that year (and still can be found around the web).  The additional pieces that I purchased were not used in the quilt so were not included in the kit.  Unfortunately I didn't get started on it until right before the July 4th holiday that year (and in fact worked on it all during the holiday) and finally finished the top by the end of that month.  I thought it would get quilted before the next year's holiday rolled around but that was not to be so.  And this year it was on my list to be quilted in April, then got bumped up to the May schedule and yet still took until this month to complete.  But a finish, is a finish no matter how long it takes to get there!

Pat's instructions called for the Sawtooth and Lemoyne Stars to be made using triangle squares (HSTs) but I made the Sawtooth star points as Flying Geese blocks and used my favorite method for those:  Eleanor Burns rulers and what she calls the "Triangle Pieced Rectangle" method.  I call it the "Two Squares" method because that's all it takes:  two squares and sewing 1/4" on both sides of a center diagonal line twice and then you have four geese!  You can see Eleanor herself demonstrating the method here.  It should be noted that in the video Eleanor also squares up the blocks with a regular ruler but I will say that using her rulers (if you are willing to make that investment) does make the trimming go faster.

And what can I say about Deb Tucker's Rapid Fire Lemoyne Star ruler except that "I'm a complete convert"!  I always shied away from making Lemoynes because of the diamond unit cutting and set-in seams.  With her ruler and instructions, Deb has made it possible to strip piece these and sew them together with regular (straight) seams.  Now I'm collecting Lemoyne quilt ideas because I want to do more, more, more with this one!  I also love and have used her Tucker Trimmer ruler and have the Hunter Star ruler but haven't tried using that one just yet (yep, I'm a gadget fanatic!).

It should be noted that using these two methods meant I wound up being a little short on the background fabrics from the kit but as always the Quilt Muses were looking out for me.  Fabric.com just happened to have a "Red, White & Blue" fabric sale the week I started on this and was carrying the fabric line at that time so I was able to do a little discounted stash enhancement to help continue the journey (as well as start some new ones as you'll see in the next post).

So very happy to be 2 for 3 for this quarter and look forward to hanging this one outside off of our terrace for the July 4th holiday!