Constellations--Multicolor

Hi everyone, and welcome back to the Constellations quilt! It's a very exciting month, because this month's color is somewhat different--it's multicolored. All those oddball scraps that don't fit anywhere else will fit here.  Don't know about you, but I've got a bunch of scraps that I never know what to do with because they're odd colors or too many colors with nothing really dominant.  This month's block will use those up, and would also be nice to use up some novelties, especially if you have something you'd like to fussy cut for the center, or the dots and stripes that you never know how to use.

Here's what we're making this month:

This is a Double Star variation, attributed to Nancy Cabot from the 1930s.  These blocks are easy to make and go pretty fast.  They use scrap pieces that are no bigger than 3 inches square, and for the purposes of our quilt, a wide variety of scraps will work best, rather than all matching stars.  These are 6-inch finished stars, and we need 8 of them for this quilt (see "This quilt section" for an explanation of how these will be used.)

Let's make some blocks!

Cutting:

For each star, you will need a background and scraps of two contrasting fabrics.  The contrast can be in pattern or color, but there should be a separation between the fabrics.  Designate one of the fabrics the "main" and the other the "accent."

From the background, cut:

1 3-1/4 inch square*
4 2-1/2 inch squares

From the main fabric, cut:

1 2-1/2 inch square
2 2-7/8 inch squares*

From the accent, cut:

1 3-1/4 inch square*

*These pieces can be oversized a bit if you're more comfortable trimming things down.

That's really it for the cutting--on to construction!

Construction:

Take the 3-1/4 inch squares of the background and the accent fabric and cut them twice corner to corner to make 4 pieces.  Cut the 2-7/8 inch squares in half once to make two triangles each:

Stack the triangles from the 3-1/4 inch squares as shown and stitch them together along the center. Press toward the background fabric.

Add the triangles cut from the 2-7/8 inch squares of the main fabric as shown.  Press toward the main fabric.

These units should measure 2-1/2 inches square, so square them up if necessary.

Assembly:

Believe it or not, that's the only unit to make for these blocks.  All that's left is to put the star together!  Lay out the units as shown, paying attention to the direction of the main fabric triangles.

Join the units into rows and the rows together into a block.

That's it! This block should measure 6-1/2 by 6-1/2 to finish at 6 inches in the quilt.   Make 8 stars for the Constellations quilt.

This quilt section:

The 8 Double Stars will be used in two sections of the quilt, section 4 and section 6.  Both of these sections also include a 12-inch star.  The 12-inch star to complete section 4 will be made in May and the star for section 6 in July.  This will give the quilt a lot of variation and spread the work over several months.  Plus, it will make those sections easy to construct, since most of the pieces will be finished!

That's it for this month!  Eight blocks seems like a lot, but really only 4 are needed for next month, so there's time to gather more scraps with a good variety. 

Have fun using up those oddball scraps, and be sure to come back May 2 for the next installment, including the exciting construction of section 4, sure to be a winner!

Sharing at Linky Tuesday, Let's Bee Social, and soscrappy for RSC17.