2014 | Collect Create Circulate

I finally finished cutting the fabric for the APQ Tone it Down quilt a long! I really tried to space out my cutting sessions a little due to my arm, but I was getting FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) watching images pop up on instagram so I pushed the limits a few nights and finished it up.

But as soon as I finished cutting I felt the need to stay up and start sewing one of the blocks. So I put in an hour of sewing, staying up until 2 am before sleep got the better of me. But I did wake up bright and early, excited to start sewing again and finish it up! And about 3 hours later I did. Can you believe it? About 4 hours for a single block! This is definitely the most intense and time consuming quilt block I have ever attempted.

I did some more math and figured out that each block has 97 individual pieces! Yikes! But I feel so accomplished having completed one, I can only imagine how I will feel when I finish the remaining 19! I really took my time , but it turns out my 1/4″ seam allowance was closer to 5/16″ so in the end I had to do some careful trimming to make up for this in order to align my corners — if I am consistent with this seam allowance through the entire quilt it won’t be an issue and the blocks will all come out the same size.

So. I have no idea how long this quilt will take me, since each block is so time-consuming. But this might be a year long project! Are you participating in the quilt a long? Did you stick with the neutral background and bright foreground? Have you checked in on the lead bloggers progress or seen a really stunning version by someone else? Let me know in the comments!

xo,