Let's get back to the Log Cabin Block of the Month

Welcome back to our Blog.  Spring has arrived so it is time to get those winter projects finished up.

As promised, here is some help with your sampler blocks from the Log Cabin Home block of the month.
We posted blocks 7, 8 and 9 back in November-December.

I am going to start here with block 12, the Royal Star, and the simple paper piecing instructions for the star points.

The process can be a little confusing but this block is a good one for a beginner's introduction to paper piecing.  We used two shades of a dusty dark rose/burgundy in the class. The center of the block is just a simple nine-patch as you can see from your pattern.  Make sure you use the darker fabric for your points and match them up to the dark block position in the 9-patch.  So below is your paper piece template.  You stitch on the lines with your fabrics on the back side of the paper.  And you stitch the pieces in numerical order.  Some people say you need to use a really short stitch length, but I find that my normal stitch length works just fine.  It's all about when it's time to remove the paper at the very end.  As a beginner, don't worry about this.

Also remember that you can click on any photo to see it larger, up close & personal!

Start with this piece of paper.  Place your first fabric (background) wrong side to the back side of the paper.  How can you tell if it's in the right place?  Hold the paper up to the light so you can see the printed lines and make sure the fabric covers the lines from 1-2 and 1-3.

The background is not stitched yet.  And the wrong side of the background is to the wrong side of the paper.  Place the next piece (dark point) right sides together on the background, with the left side of the piece over the line between 1 and 2 (holding it to light so you can see through)

This image shows the background in place and piece 2 and 3 stitched on the lines.  The first piece you stitched right sides together onto the background (shown on left side of photo), fold it over the seam allowance then add the next piece to the stitching line opposite.  When you stitch on the line you make seams that are random sizes so just trim them down to an approximate quarter inch.  Yes, keep picking up the paper, holding the fabric in place and hold up to light to check position.

This photo shows how to position the background pieces that form the corners next to the star points.

Stitch one in place fold it away and stitch the next one in place, as shown below.

Almost there!  You can see the trimmed seam allowance showing through the background piece on the right.

The piecework on top in this image shows everything stitched in place on the paper foundation.  Flip the whole piece over and trim off the excess by following the outside lines on the paper.  Now fold the paper back and forth along the stitching lines until you can pull the paper away easily.  You Are Done with the first corner of the block!   Now repeat the process for the remaining three corners.

Stitch these corners to the nine-patch one at a time as shown on page two of your pattern.  There you go, and that wasn't too bad now was it?  You can always come on in to the shop for some help.  

Next blog post will cover all the remaining blocks - the patterns for them were clear enough that you should just breeze right along.