The finished size was a 66" square but I wanted to make it longer so that it would fit a twin sized bed. My plan was to design an additional strip that would be sewn to the top of what I had so far in order to create a longer, rectangular quilt.
To begin, I created a section of Tumbling Block units (that I wrote about here) and that was as far as I had gotten.
Here we are in 2020 with plenty of dedicated stay-at-home time and I knew it was time to get back to work on this.
I wanted to have a section of little houses so I began with those. It was fun to choose all the fabrics for the houses, doors and roofs. These little guys each measure 3 X 4 inches.
The houses unit would be sewn to the left of the tumbling blocks, and I decided on Friendship Stars to go on the right side:
The pinwheel centers of the stars have a finished measurement of only 2".
I needed one more narrow strip of blocks to make the additional section wide enough, and I chose some Card Trick blocks.
These blocks required a good amount of concentration to keep the orientation straight, but I loved the end result. They measure 3 inches, and made for a darling little filler strip:
As I finished each of the sections, I laid them out on the bed near the previously finished quilt top to see how they would look. As you can see in the photo below I also added a horizontal filler strip of one inch squares, under the Friendship Stars.
I was pleased that the vertical sashing strip between the Tumbling Blocks and the Friendship Stars would line up directly on top of a vertical sashing strip of the quilt top I had made so far. This would help keep the newly created strip from looking like the add-on that it was.
Eventually, it all came together into a new, longer quilt top!
Designing the top row to compliment the rest of the quilt was a challenge, and actually took several days to complete. The hardest part was coming up with design elements that helped balance the dark and light areas of the rest of the quilt. I feel good about how it turned out and can't wait to get it quilted.
STATS:
Number of pieces in the Houses section: 110
Number of pieces in the Card Trick section: 120
Number of pieces in the Tumbling Blocks section: 306
Number of pieces in the Friendship Stars section: 180
Number of pieces in the previously finished part of the quilt: 2414
TOTAL number of pieces: 3130