Yesterday I pulled a pile of Grunge fabrics from my stash, looking for bright colours to strengthen the bright elements within the  panel.

I’m after a final block size of 5 3/4″ (I’ll go down to 5 1/2″ if I have to). I began by cutting 5 1/2 strips from the panel, cut them into blocks, then cut the “pie” shaped pieces from those.

Next I cut 6 1/2″ strips – enough so far for 48 blocks – then cut the “L” shaped pieces from those (that gives me 48 “pie” pieces to use for another project!). Then I cut 2 “pie” pieces from the grunge fabrics.

Cut Blocks

I paired dark to light/light to dark (more or less) and set them into two piles. Then I began stitching some drunkard’s path blocks. Everything you read recommends doing a lot of pinning – I find I get a better block if I do no pinning at all – just align the “pie” element on top at the end of the “L” piece, then using my 1/4″ right guide quilting foot to slowly stitch the curved seam, aligning the edges carefully as I go along. My resulting block isn’t perfect but close enough that I’ve been able to trim them to 6 1/4″ which will give me a finished 5 3/4″ block.

Skyline #3

I’ve finished seven blocks and as I go along I will play with layout. I’m already liking how the buildings in the panel have disappeared and the colour definitely stands out. That was the effect I had in mind and it looks like it is going to work out as I was visualizing it.

Now I need to construct the remaining 41 blocks. I’m anticipating a 7 x 9 array – 63 blocks in all so after the 48 I will still need to cut out and stitch 15 more blocks. I have more than enough fabric from the panel to do that. I’ll cut them out tomorrow.

Skyline #3 is underway.