It's About Value

When placed together the pattern of these Buckeye Beauty blocks is beginning to emerge:  diagonal rows of light centers and dark centers with a checkerboard where the corners meet.

My usual process for making a quilt like this is to pull a bunch of fabrics, cut shapes, sew them into blocks, then lay them out.  After a good many are made, I decide which ones work and which don't and whether I need to make more and what colors.  With 13 made I have 29 more to go.  I expect these will change places as new ones are added.  Because this quilt is about value, I'm thinking of unstitching the one third row down, third from the left.  I think those two fabrics are the same value!

The idea for this quilt came directly from Lynn Roddy Brown's book, Patchwork-play Quilts:  Make the Most of Scraps, Spare Parts, and Leftovers.  Early in the book she discusses value, something I haven't paid much attention to when choosing fabrics.  Her strategy is to pair fabrics in light and medium; light and dark; or medium and dark.  I'm all about color, but after reading her thoughts, I began noticing.  Her explanation was so clear and the photos helped clarify what she was saying.  Then when I saw her "Buckeye Beauty" quilt I decided it might (or might not) work for a little boy's quilt.

Buckeye Beauty blocks are usually sewn all the same which creates a strong one direction diagonal.  Lynn has rearranged the blocks so some have light centers and some dark.  The four-patches on the corners alternate, too, depending on the centers.  The layout then creates diagonal rows of lights and darks and a checkerboard in the corners where the blocks meet. 

Lynn's blocks are 8" but I like baby quilts with smaller blocks so I changed the size.  These blocks will finish at 6" so they are a little smaller.  Using a 6 by 7 layout the quilt will be 36" x 42", without borders.  I love the fact that I can use small scraps for this quilt, and I can imagine it becoming really scrappy with several different fabrics of the same color and value per block.

I'm making progress on my star quilt.  I finished cutting the colored strips for the next border today.  They're laying alongside the quilt and tomorrow I'll play with color placement.


I'm linking this post to Let's Book It - May 2016, Oh Scrap!, WOW, Let's Bee Social, Moving it Forward Monday, Scraptastic Tuesday, and Design Wall Monday.  Thanks for hosting, ladies.

Thanks for visiting!
--Nancy.
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