May’s blocks on Meadowside

Over on Meadowside Designs, as you have probably gathered by now, we are working our way through the alphabet with a sampler series of six-inch blocks. May sees us arrive at H (and later I and even J). This week our H blocks include Hour Glass. There are (literally) dozens of blocks that have been given this name or contain these words. We chose four similar ones to feature on Meadowside

but here’s just a few of the others simply called Hour Glass that we found –

That last one was designed by Carlie Sexton and published in 1928 (Barbara Brackman) and we rather thought some of you might fancy making it, so you can download the templates to make a 12 inch (six inch seemed a little small?) block. It might fit in quite well with some of the other star blocks we are featuring here at Chris & Barbara this year.

Doodles for April

Our block for this month is Temple Court – another one of our traditional style favourites. Here’s the block as it appears in the EQ8 Library

And here’s a variation of the Temple Court block with an adjustment at the centre making it much easier to piece – we’ve twiddled the colouring so that you can see the adjustment clearly.

We’ve played first with the block as it appears in EQ8, switching colours and moving them around the block –

And then there were the quilts from these blocks, just in straight settings, no sashings –

We had to pause at this point and remember to show the easier-to-piece variation, starting with the block and moving on to quilts.

So, some interesting options from simple changes – and changes that are so easy to make in EQ8 so that you can review before committing to cloth! Download a pdf with a Temple Court block to colour, templates, EQ8s rotary cutting instructions here. Our Technical Department has also produced a pdf to download for the Temple Court variation so you have the best of both worlds!

March Doodles

Slightly behind schedule with our March Doodles but better late than never! For this month we’ve chosen the Rhode Island block –

We rather like the star within a star effect of this block and we started our Doodling by swapping from cool to warm colouring –

And on to quilt settings –

You can download rotary cutting instructions and templates to make your own Rhode Island block together with a “skeleton” block and a quilt to colour in – click here! https://chrisandbarbaraquilts.files.wordpress.com/2022/03/march-rhode-island.pdf

January EQ Doodles

We love stars! One of Chris’s books was devoted entirely to stars –

and we’ve taken a star theme for our 2022 Doodles. Each month we’ll feature a different star block from the EQ and BlockBase libraries and show some colour and value changes to the block and then show the block in some simple quilt settings. Where possible we’ll include a free download pdf of the templates for a 12inch block. You could stitch all or just some of the blocks, multiples of one block, maybe even collect them all together to make a Stellar Sampler.

Here’s Block One – Double Windmill from the EQ Library. Download the PDF.

Some changes to both colour and value placement –

Significant differences emerge in simple quilt settings –

It’s always worth considering the “on point” option –

Sashing can make a real difference whether the setting is straight or on point –

If you would like to make this block or an entire quilt then download the PDF which contains cutting instructions, templates, piecing instructions and colouring-in pages!

Festive Friday

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Pick of the year

Before we get into a whole new year we thought we’d look back and show you our pick of all the EQ Doodles we posted in 2021. In case you need a break from any New Year festivity we have put a few of these into a PDF of ‘quilts to colour‘ which you can download and print out.

(still the uncorrected version! Have you spotted the hiccup?)

Signing off 2021 and sending best wishes for the year ahead from all the staff at C&B Towers, the Rural Office and the Overseas Office

Chris & Barbara

Festive Friday

Festive Friday

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Festive Friday

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Festive Friday