The Winding Ways Quilt

Well if you in the Northeast US, then you are just sick of the snow this winter. I actually like winter, I used to ski (hopefully will do again) and enjoy the change of seasons. But my goodness - enough is enough - there is just no where left to put the snow in the driveway!!
As I am writing this post, another 1 - 2 feet is forecast for the Boston Area for Sunday into Tuesday  early. Depends on where you are.
I will leave my RI ocean sanctuary today - Sunday-  to go back to my metro-Boston home- to work from home on yet another snowy Monday. But I am blessed in all this by several things

• I have two homes (many have none)
• I can work from home - and not everyone has that privilege - and it is a privilege. My job lends itself to this structure - I spend my days in spread sheets, with numbers and I have very supportive management.

So - back to quilting! The first of our children's generation on my husband's side is getting married this summer. I think this may open up the flood gates - eek!! This means I have to actually make and FINISH quilts.

I was inspired by this Winding Ways Quilt I am making,  from a similar quilt in the last issue of The Quilt Life Magazine (October 2014). The quilt was Jan Magee's "Rosita Meadows". She made it in Japanese Taupes.  The colors would not work for me - but I loved the design - classic Winding Ways block.

I like the circular movement of the pattern.

As I noted earlier I am trying to become more proficient with my EQ7. It is such a great tool.

So I found the Winding Ways Block in the block library, and set off to design a similar quilt in blues.

I have a TON of blues in my stash, and have also been inspired by the utilization of scraps from Bonnie Hunter's site. - BTW - if you have never gone to her blog - GO THERE. You may not be into scrappy necessarily, but this woman is the most prolific, organized quilter on earth. Check out the link to her blog.

Here is what I came up with

EQ7 Print out of my Winding Ways Quilt &
 the Card With how many of each shape and color I needed

This was the first time I approached a quilt like this. Normally I just follow a written pattern.

In this case I had to figure out how many of each block component I needed in each color

Hence the file card below. EQ will definitely calculate yardage for you, but I was going to be using my Accuquilt GO! Cutter and Winding Ways Block die!!

Accuquilt GO! Winding Ways 8 Inch Die

So I counted the 

• Corners
• Wedges (narrow triangles)
• Triangles (large 4 leaf clover looking patches)

For each of the Dark Blue, Medium Blue, and Neutral. I actually have a tiny bit of light blue - but I will see how this progresses as it goes up on the design wall.

Sorted the stash I had brought to the beach and started cutting!

I then printed out each block type combination from the quilt, and counted how many of each I needed. I am sure people who regularly design quilts do this all the time.

It was really interesting and fun. I feel like I am doing this quilt from start to finish.

So I have not cut all the pieces, but I have started the construction.

Some hurdles - more on that in my next post.

Happy Quilting

Mary