I counted my darker vs. lighter blocks for the Splendid Sampler over the weekend and of 48 at the time, I think only 20 were darker.  I’m trying to keep an even balance overall for the quilt which means I’m going to make a concerted effort to work in more of the darker fabrics where I can, or at least around the perimeter of the blocks like I did in this case.

With that in mind, the first thing I did when I started this block was…well instead of working on it yesterday, I took a 3 hour nap instead!  Wow, I must have really been tired.  I do love naps but that combined with an “early to bed and late to rise” combination just hours before put me at 11.5 hours of sleep in one day.

Eventually though, lunchtime rolled around today and I was back at the sewing.  This block starts off with a pinwheel, which I always like, especially when it’s combined in an overall quilt.  In this case, it’s just one block but still fun.

I think overall we have some fantastic designers and this one is no exception but I will state that the method used in this block to make the half square triangles isn’t the most efficient and uses more fabric than is necessary.  Onward.  I finished the pinwheel and the bottom right-hand quadrant was off just a smidgen so I pulled it out and sewed it again.  And it was off a smidgen again.  I was just about to sew it again for the 3rd time when I remembered….

Oh yeah!  We’re appliqueing a flower on top so it won’t even matter!  That was a mini success story.

Earlier this summer or maybe it was spring, I bought a package of these mini charm packs.  The fabric on top in this photo is representative of the rest of them in this pack which makes it perfect for little pops of light colored fabric in this sampler.  I ended up using 3 squares – 2 for the outer petals and then a slightly different fabric for the circle in the center.

I ironed Heat ‘n Bond to the back of each mini charm first and then traced around each piece before cutting them out and did the same for the actual flower.

Probably the biggest challenge in this was getting the outer petals lined up so that they just barely met the flower which kept those lighter petals as large as possible and also uniform.

I set my sewing machine on the slowest speed and took my time sewing it together, starting in the middle and then working my way out.  I sewed the flower next and finally the light petals, doubling up with 2 or 3 stitches as needed to make a continuous sewing line.  My machine automatically sews 3 stitches in place at the start and stop when I have it on a blanket stitch setting and I decided it would be less obvious overall if I continued stitching around, rather than starting and stopping on each of the lighter petals.

And once again, I can see I forgot to clear off all the loose threads before I took the photo.  Sorry!