All About Strings Blog Hop - Spring Strings

Hey everyone and welcome to my day of the All About Strings Blog Hop hosted by Carla of Creatin' in the Sticks.

The Hop is running till Thursday, so make sure to follow along for some fabric String inspiration.
The full schedule is listed at the bottom of the page.

 It is officially Spring here. Flowers are blooming all around town and in honor of all the beautiful blooms and colors sprouting up...

I decided to go with a Springtime theme with my Strings.

 I am calling this one Spring Strings. It measures approximately 72 x 54 inches.

 These tulips are big blocks coming in at 11 1/4 x 21 inches and today I would like to share my tutorial on how I made them, but before we get into all that...

 I want to show off  another smaller string project I made for the hop.  A mini tuffet pin cushion.  Isn't it so cute! I have the pattern for the regular size tuffet but decided to start out with this mini one.  It was quick to put together with some of my batik strings and not as frightening as I imaged it would be.  I sewed it up in one evening. The pattern suggested spray painting the legs and I may do that once I figure out what color use.  

And now for the tutorial on the Tulip Block.

If you would like to make your own, start by picking fabric strings in your favorite color,

 or if you like, you can even make scrappy tulips.  My strings measured from 1.25 to 1.5 inches.

	Create a 10 x 4.5 inch strip of your favorite strings. The strip can be a wee bit longer than 10 inches if your strips are longer. No need to trim them to exactly 10 inches, we will trim later, but the width does needs to be trimmed to 4.5 inches.  Clean up the right edge with your ruler and rotary cutter.  Using a 45 degree ruler, cut off a triangle from the right edge.  Make sure you leave 1/4 inch seam allowance on the right side.  This can be easily done with the "Easy Angle Ruler" or any ruler that helps you make flying geese.  I used the Flying Geese ruler by Mari Michell because it was close.  But you can also eyeball it.  Just be generous if you eyeball it.  It's easier to trim it down than cut a whole new piece.
	Cut a 5 inch White Square, sub-cut it on the diagonal to get two white triangles. (If your going to cut a lot, you can cut a 4.5 inch strip and used the "Easy Angle Ruler" to cut the triangles. That is what I did and why one end of my triangles has a notch at the top.)
	Cut a 2.5 inch White Square. Make a small 2.5 inch square from your strings. Cut a 2.5 a 4.5 inch White Rectangle. Angle the two pieces from the original string 10 inch strip set to form the base of the tulip.  Make sure all the strings are going the same direction. Sew a white triangle to both the  angled edges of your larger string pieces.  Press.  Trim the smaller square to 4.5 inches. This creates a Half Square Triangle and will make one side of the tulip.
	Trim the longer string strip to measure 8.5 x 4.5 inches.
	Sew the 2.5 inch String square together with the 2.5  inch white square. Press and then sew the 4.5 x 2.5 inch white rectangle to the newly sewn String/White rectangle.  This creates the 4.5 inch square for the top of the tulip. Sew the 4.5 inch top square of the tulip to the 4.5 inch half square triangle that makes up one side of the tulip.
	You should now have two halves of the tulip.  Sew these two halves together.
	If all has gone well you should now have a cute tulip block that measures 8 inch square.
	Cut two 7 inch white squares, sub cut these on the diagonal to give you 4 triangles. Or if you are cutting a lot like me you can use the easy angle ruler and cut a 6.5 inch strip and cut your triangles that way.
	Sew these four white triangles to the tulip block. I sewed opposite sides first, then flipped the block and added the other two sides.
	For the leaves, make a 10 inch strip of green strings, sub-cut to make two 4.5 inch squares.
	Cut four 2 inch white squares.  Draw a line on these on the diagonal using your favorite method. I pressed mine in half with the iron to create a sewing line. Align your two green squares side by side with the strings going vertical.  Place a white square in the upper right corner and lower left corner of the Left square. Do the opposite for the right square, placing a white square in the upper left and lower right. It is good idea to lay them out by your machine in the way you want to sew them.  This will save you time you don't want to spend with the seam ripper later. Sew on the line you marked. I like to sew a thread's width on the side of the line towards the seam allowance.  This way my triangle won't shrink when I iron it out. Trim off the excess fabric from each  each white corner by cutting 1/4 inches away from the seam.  Press.
	Cut two 4 x 4.5 in white rectangles. Align the 4.5 edges together and sew the white rectangles to the top of the leaf square.
	Cut a 1 x 8 inch green strip. Sew the leave sections to the strip. This creates the stem.
	Cut two 8 x 1 7/8 white strips.  Or you can cut them 8 x 2 and trim them down later.  Sew these to the sides of the leaf block. Cut one 2.5 x 11.75 inch white strip. Sew this to the bottom of the leaf block.
	Sew the top of the tulip to the leaf section. My unfinished tulip block measured  21.5 x 11.75. Sewing with triangles always makes things tricky, so if the top of your tulip block comes out wider or smaller, just adjust the width of the white side strips on the leaf section to match the top of your tulip section. Then cut the length of the bottom 2.5 inch strip to match the width of the top of the tulip.

For even more inspiration, here are some throwback images to some of my previous string projects.
Almost all of them were made for Project Quilting.

The Marsh. One of my Project Quilting entries from last year.

Winter Sleep - Another PQ entry - Theme was trees that week.

Lollipop Orchard. - String background. Another PQ entry.

Relaxing Starfish - My first ever entry for project Quilting.

Shirt Quilt

Make sure you find time to check out the other projects being posted today.

Tuesday, March 26th

MooseStash Quilting

keepsake moments

Just Sew Quilter

Vroomans Quilts

That Fabric Feeling

Quilted Delights (Me)

Life in Scrapatch

Patchouli Moon Studio

ShirleyC

And if you missed any yesterday,  Here is the whole schedule.  We will be here all week! ...  well at least till Thursday. 

Monday, March 25th

Just Let Me Quilt

Kathy's Kwilts and More

Bumbleberry Stitches

QuiltFabrication

Seams to be Sew

DesertSky Quilting

Happy Cottage Quilter

quiltsbyjoanne

selina quilts

Homespun Hannah's Blog

Karrin's Crazy World

Tuesday, March 26th

MooseStash Quilting

keepsake moments

Just Sew Quilter

Vroomans Quilts

That Fabric Feeling

Quilted Delights

Life in Scrapatch

Patchouli Moon Studio

ShirleyC

Wednesday, March 27th

Stitchin at Home

Alycia Quilts

Websterquilt

Elizabeth Coughlin Designs

Melva Loves Scraps

Words & Stitches

Den syende himmel

Patchwork Breeze
Domestic Felicity
The Quilted Snail


Thursday, March 28th

Cynthia's Creating Ark
The Joyful Quilter
Color Creating and Quilting
PamelaQuilts
Beaquilter
Two Maker Chicks
Days Filled With Joy
Quilting & Learning - What a Combo!

Creatin' in the Sticks

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