Diamond Girl

 The Lincoln Modern Quilt Guild's recent challenge was called the "Half Rectangle Triangle Challenge." Try saying that three times fast! I haven't participated in a challenge in many a moon, so I decided what the heck, give it a whirl. There were no real parameters. The quilt just needed to have half rectangle triangles. 

My inspiration for this quilt came from an optical illusion mirror I saw at the Kiewit Luminarium. After I saw that slatted double sided mirror, I googled around and found this tutorial for Interleave Quilts. Aren't they so cool?!!  I decided I wanted to make large half rectangle triangle units and mix them together to see what designs I could get. I made templates out of freezer paper and away I went...like literally, I think I made three trips to Joann's for fabric haha! Here are the color combinations I used.

I cut each HRT into one inch strips, carefully keeping them in order. Then I mixed the two together. Sewing one of these units took awhile, maybe around 3 hours a piece. It's a quilt as you go process. I found that my edges started to get a little wonky and it was difficult to keep everything straight. My finished piece is not perfectly straight! My points don't match either but I decided to just push on and finish it. 

Part of the fun with these blocks was playing around with the placement! I really enjoyed that part but it was not easy for me to decide which layout I liked the best. 

Even though I used the same template for the HRTs, for some reason not all the strips came out at one inch when I got to cutting the last strips of the block. A couple had final strips that were 3/4". That caused a problem with making matching points. It probably has to do with how I sewed the HRTs together in the first place. If I make one of these again, I would try to be more accurate with sewing the HRTs and with sewing the strips together on the batting. I might also try it with bigger strips. 

For the backing, I used this fun giraffe fabric I've had in my stash for years. The colors match perfectly! 

This was a fun experiment for me! I enjoyed choosing the colors. I loved the surprise of seeing what emerged from mixing up the two blocks. And then seeing all the ways the placement of the blocks created different transparencies. This was a lot of fun to create! While I was making this, the song Diamond Girl popped into my head and I decided it would be a fun name for this quilt. 

Diamond Girl

32" x 43.5" 

Made for the LMQG's "Half Rectangle Triangle Challenge"