Fat Eighths? New quilter

[ReneMax]

Greetings Everyone! Thanks to Craftsy I have completed my first quilt! So excited!  For my second quilt I purchased a book called Modern Quilts Block by Block. I am having a hard time understanding the way this book is laid out.

First: She is calling for 20 fat eighths. I am making this quilt for a specific occasion, and I need dark greens and dark blue fabrics. I am not finding F8 in the colors I need. Can I buy a fat quarte and make it in to two fat eighths? Or is there another solution for this? 

Secondly: The star pattern features 20 different accent fabrics at the center of the star. In the materials requirement the accent fabric is listed as "2 yards," as opposed to, say, 10 fat quarters, etc. So how do I interpret this per accent fabric stars? They are all different, but it only calls for two yards. I am so confused. 

 

Thank you for any help! 

Rene

 

 

[SueD]

You could use fat quarters if you’re not finding fat eighths. You could have more than one block with the same fabric (if you buy 10 FQ)  Or you’ll just have leftovers to add to your stash (buy 20 FQ).

This pattern does seem confusing as far as what they call the fabrics.

As I read this:

FQ = color B

Accent = color A

White = background 

It looks to me like the center square in each block is the white/background fabric.  It looks like those are the 4” cut pieces because everything else is an even quantity. 

If you wanted to make the center squares from a different fabric than the white/background, you certainly could.  If you’re doing blues and greens as your stars, you should have enough fabric (even using F8) to cut a 4” block. So if you had a blue star, you could do a green center square and vice versa. 

Just a thought… check out Fat Quarter Shop for free patterns. I find their patterns are very well written for beginners. 

Good luck and reply if you need more help!

Sue

[ReneMax]

Thank you!

That makes more sense. So, if I want to do two of the blocks in the same color, I could use one fat quarter and get two out of that? Ten FQ will yield 20 blocks.

Can I tell you that I have been staring at these 4 pages for two days :o). 

I appreciate the help!

[SueD]

Yes, you can easily get 2 sets of star pieces out of a FQ.  There's enough to get at least 3. 

If you had a F8 that was at least 21" (usable fabric, excluding the selvage) you could squeeze out 2 blocks from the F8.  You can see in the layout for the first cutting (pink), there's a lot of fabric you don't use.

3.375   3.375  3.375  3.375   3.75   3.75 = 21" across

3.75  3.75  3.375   3.375  3.375  3.375 = 21" across

Underlined amounts would give you pieces for a 2nd block.  Those 2 rows together are 7 1/8" vertically.  

I find it helpful to just draw it out on scratch paper to see the different arrangements for cutting.  They don't have to be to scale - just draw boxes and label the dimensions.  Then add them up across and down and see what you need.  You could use sticky notes too (label dimensions) - that would make it easier to move them around.