Spinning stars – and spinning seams too!

I have been burrowing through boxes, collections of odd blocks and WIP’s trying to get as many quilts finished and ready for the longarm as possible before I’m allowed to start something new. One of my old projects was these scrappy stars, of which I made exactly 7/8ths of 1 star. Hmmmm……

Originally based on Little Miss Shabby’s String Star tutorial, found HERE, I decided that I didn’t care about finishing the block, and simply whipped up the missing arm and pieced the 8 units together to make a star.

Here is where the spinning seam is so important. The key with this block was to stop stitching at the 1/4″ line, instead of stitching all the way into the centre of each seam. Joined in pairs, then into half blocks, then into a final star, I was able to separate all the individual units and spin the final seam to give me an almost flat, perfectly aligned centre join.

For further help, click on the links below….

The finished star was pressed, then pinned onto a spare fat quarter which had been pressed into quarters. This is such a quick and easy way to align an applique onto a background – whether it’s English Paper Pieced, Foundation Pieced, a dresden plate etc.

In order to secure the points of the star, I added a dab of washable gluestick under each one. This meant that I could move the fabric around under the presser foot of the machine without it shifting. It worked really well and I didn’t have any movement at all. I set my Janome to a small blanket stitch and in no time I had worked my way around the whole star.

Now I have a beautiful block ready to be added to a quilt, turned into a cushion, or as shown above, pinned onto my curtain and giving me a beautiful stained glass effect. One WIP down, only about a hundred to go!!

How are you going with your WIP busting? Or is the lure of the new shiny quilt too much for you?

Happy Crafting - Cassie.

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2 Responses

  1. Kay Bose

    Hi Cassandra, I’m searching for the paper pieced pattern for the 8 point spinning star pattern. I enjoy paper pieced patterns. Thank you so much.

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