Beautiful Day Mystery Quilt Along Block 1: Starry-Eyed

Good morning and Happy Saturday!  Today is the release of the first block in the Beautiful Day Mystery Quilt Along….yay!

If you have missed the fabric requirements for this quilt along, you can find them here.

Each month, we are going to be making four different blocks using the same block pattern.  This month we will be making 4 simple Sawtooth Star blocks.  The blocks will feature the panel in the center.  You can see how the addition of the panel brings something special to these blocks.  If you have never worked with a panel before, please make sure to read all the way to the bottom of the post where I will answer some frequently asked panel questions and link to my video on cutting panel squares.  I’ve also created a video tutorial for the Starry-Eyed block which can be found here.  I’ll be sharing video tutorials for each block on the release day (the 3rd Saturday of each month).

Click here for the Starry-Eyed block pattern.

These blocks were so much fun to make.  They will finish at 16″ x 16″ square once sewn into the quilt top which means we won’t be working with small pieces.

I think it is so fun how that panel center makes even these simple blocks look so elegant.  When I designed this panel, I wanted it to look like traditional applique.  I am such an applique girl but don’t always have time to complete it.

I hope you all have so much fun making your Starry-Eyed blocks!

Now I wanted to take a few minutes to answer some of the questions that I’ve been answering most frequently.

“I’ve never worked with a panel before.  How do I cut it apart?”

Answer:  I shared a video on that earlier this week.  You can find it on my YouTube channel here.  I will also be sharing a video tutorial for each block release of this quilt along and would love if you’d subscribe so you don’t miss any of them.  Or any of the other new videos that I will be sharing.

“My panel is short on the top and/or bottom and I don’t have enough space to cut an 8 1/2″ square.  What do I do now?”

Answer:  Sometimes, we will get a panel that is just a little bit short on either the top or bottom if it was cut that way.  There are a couple different work arounds for this.  I’m going to share a couple different options with you:

1.  You can always buy another panel.  We can often get around needing to buy another panel but it is the simplest fix. This quilt along will use 20 out of the 24 panel blocks.  Extra panel squares can be used for so many different things…pillows, runners, bags, pot holders etc.  You might like the idea of being able to make coordinating projects with the extra panel squares to go with your quilt.
2. You might find that you are only short just a little bit on a couple blocks.  If that is the case, you can still use the panel square and opt to use a slightly narrower seam allowance on the short side.  For the Starry-Eyed blocks, if I had been a little bit short on one side of the center panel block, I could have sewn one of the flying geese to that side using slightly less than 1/4″ to compensate.
3. If a narrower seam allowance won’t be enough to fix the shortage, you can add a little border piece of fabric to the short side.  I would cut a piece of background fabric (9900-200 matches the white color in both Beautiful Day and Apricot & Ash) 1″ to 1.5″ x 9″.  Sew this piece to the short side using a 1/4″ seam allowance.  Press your seam open.  Center and trim the block to 8 1/2″ square.  I used this method on a tea towel quilt I was working on a couple years ago.  I had purchased tea towels from Fancy That Design House before she was designing for Moda so I could use them to make a quilt.  Because of the placement of the motif at the bottom of the tea towels, I found that on some of them I needed to add a little bit more fabric to the bottom after I cut them from the towel.  Here is what one of those blocks looked like after I added the border:

Once this block is sewn within the quilt and quilted this little seam won’t really be noticed.

4.  You can also add an intentional, contrasting border around the entire, panel block and then trim it down to size.  I don’t know that anyone will use this method for our quilt along, but it’s nice to have the option.  I used this method when writing the pattern for my Praises quilt pattern so I could easily square everything up:

Those are a couple different ways to work with a short panel.  I don’t want to scare anyone into thinking panels are always short…because they are often not.  But I want you to have as much info as you can so you know what to do in case yours happens to be.  I love the possibilities that having a panel adds to a line!

“I am starching my fabrics.  Should/Can I starch the panel also?”

Answer:  I did a little bit of hands on research to be able to give you guys the best answer for this.  I used a Beautiful Day fat quarter bundle with the included panel for my quilt just like many of you are using.  I pre-starched all of my fat quarters for this quilt along as well as the panel using the Lisa Bongean method of starching (the same method Kimberly Jolly uses) with Faultless spray starch.  I know some enjoy using this method of starching before cutting out fabrics.  If you aren’t familiar with this starching method, you can see Lisa talk about it here.

I typically reserve this method of starching for when I am piecing smaller blocks (6″ and smaller) but I wanted to see how the panel would behave with that method of starching…if I would run into any panel shortages.  Note: I want to mention again that, for me personally, I would not starch blocks of this size.  I wanted to provide this information for those of you that like to starch blocks of all sizes.

I had no problem with fabric shortage on any of the fabrics including the panel.  I was able to cut out all all of the 24 panel squares at 8 1/2″ square which was just what I wanted.

With that being said, I would recommend double checking your top/bottom panel blocks before deciding whether you’d like to starch or not.  The fabrics will shrink more from left to right but if you’re short on the top or bottom it’s something to consider.

The other thing I noticed is that I needed to be careful with how I dried the panel after it was starched.  With the amount of starch used, the panel becomes heavy, and is best dried flat so the weight doesn’t pull the motifs crooked.  Think about the difference in laying a sweater flat to dry as opposed to draping a sweater over a rod to dry.

And now some non-panel related questions. =)

“When will the 108″ wide Beautiful Day backings be in quilt shops?”

Answer:  Very soon!–the bolts that I ordered just arrived this week.  Quilts shops that ordered will be receiving them soon as well.

“How long is this quilt along?”

Answer:  This is a 6 month quilt along.  New blocks will be released on the 3rd Saturday of each month.  If you’d like those exact dates, here they are:

Block 1 (Today): February 19, 2022

Block 2: March 19, 2022

Block 3: April 16, 2022

Block 4: May 21, 2022

Block 5: June 18, 2022

Finishing Instructions: July 16, 2022

“How do I sign up for the block of the month?”

Answer:  No need to sign up.  Just stop by my blog on release days.  All of the blocks and the finishing instructions will be shared here.  The video tutorials will be shared on my YouTube channel but you will need to download the patterns here.  You can sign up to be notified when I publish blog posts over on the left side of this page under “subscribe to blog via email”.  If you are on a mobile device viewing my blog, flip your phone horizontally and click the pink arrows on the top/left to see the subscribe heading.

If you have any other questions, please leave them in the comments below.  I have been answering them directly in the comments so others can see the answers as well.  If you are sharing your blocks on Instagram, use #beautifuldaymysterybom so we can see your photos.  And if you’d like to share on Facebook, feel free to join my private Coriander Quilts group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/776236672755163 Answer all of the membership questions to be approved.

Thank you so much for stopping by today!  I hope you enjoy sewing up your Starry-Eyed blocks.  Have a wonderful weekend! Corey