Friday, November 30, 2012

Block 5 - James Carlile

Crazy Nasturtium Leaves


As I've said before, I am a needleturn beginner.  My first two blocks, Jane Wilson's and Elizabeth Cowan's, were confidence building.  Needleturn isn't so hard after all!  I can do this!  My third block was this one.


Those of you who are more experienced than I can guess at the difficulties I had.  There are points and turns and lots of little curves.  But that's OK, if we only did easy things we would never get better.  The leaves reminded me of nasturtium leaves, so I mentally called this block Crazy Nasturtiums.  It also reminded me of pressed flowers, arranged between the pages of a book so all the flowers and leaves are flat.

The original block is not one piece of fabric.  It was pieced from leftovers and includes a seam down the middle of one leaf.  It is all made from the same fabric however.  I thought about making the leaves separately from the stem, and made a second block.


I printed the pattern twice and used one for the stem and the other for the leaves.  Don't forget to number the leaves before they are cut out.  It was still a fussy block to sew.  The corners on the leaves end up padded with the turned-under hem, but that makes the leaf more three dimensional.  I think I like this one better than the original.  

How are you going to make James' block?

2 comments:

  1. I am going to make mine with 2 greens and not as a whole but do really love both methods!
    Have a wonderful much deserved holiday looking forward to the new year..from Canada

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  2. I love how you have used the two different fabrics - I think I will also do this.

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