#focuscuttingsewalong January 2021 roundup

 Hello everyone!

I am actually managing to keep on top of a sewalong so far this year! The #focuscuttingsewalong (previously known as the #fussycuttingsewalong), is a paper piecing sewalong organised by Naomi Clarke on Instagram. It is now in it's fourth year! I like this one because it's very informal and relaxed, people can join in as much or as little as they like. I have joined in with the previous three years. My 'Fussy Cutting Forest' Quilt uses the hexagon flower blocks from the the first year (2018) and I am currently working on handquilting it. My 'Fussy In The Sky With Diamonds' from the second year (2019) is still being pieced - I am adding borders to all the blocks, and I still have 3 or 4 blocks outstanding that I didn't manage to make in that year. Last year (2020) I decided to do one block a week, instead of one a month, and 2020 being the mess that it was I didn't manage to complete even the 12 blocks. I totally do intend to finish them at one point, and I am starting to have some ideas for how to set the blocks.

And now it's 2021! I am resolved to actually keep on top of it this year, and I have made a really good start. I have completed 6 blocks for January - that's one for each of the 4 weeks and two bonus blocks! Our shape this year is the half-hexie. We are making 'medal' blocks of 6 half-hexies around a central hexagon block (which can itself be pieced from half-hexies, diamonds or triangles if we wish. I am not doing that).  I have chosen to use 1.5 inch pieces (the length of the two shorter sides of the half-hexies) mostly because I already had loads of papers in that size.

We have an overarching theme for each month, and then Naomi gives a specific prompt each week for the type of focus cutting she wants us to do.  January's theme, as is traditional for this sewalong, is the Pantone colour of the year. This year Pantone has nominated two colours: grey and yellow. I am afraid I did not find this combo of colours particularly inspiring, but part the challenge of the sewalong is to look at things in ways you wouldn't usually.

So, week 1, the prompt was an identifiable motif. I got given a fat quarter bundle of cute monster fabrics by my mother for Christmas (and I think I may have sent her the exact same bundle as part of her Christmas present!). Some of them are yellow, so knowing what the prompt was likely to be, I had this earmarked ready to go as soon as Naomi officially announced the kick-off of the sewalong.

Cute little monsters saying hello! Which is particularly appropriate for week 1, when we are also introducing ourselves, and getting to know the new people joining for the first time this year.  It really is a lovely, friendly community, and I am glad we are still getting new people joining in.

Week 2, the prompt was 'obscure sections'. This means we have to take a small part of a motif and arrange it in such a way that it makes a new pattern, different to the original fabric, and it is difficult to guess what the motif originally was. I made two blocks for this week.  Here is my first one, and the fabric I used (Simba from the Lion King). 

Although this was well-received on Instagram, I didn't really feel like the lion motif was obscure enough. So I made a second block.

I am much happier with the 'obscurity' of this one. There are clues in the block that it has stormtroopers (Like the word 'Wars' from 'Star Wars', and all the little TIE fighters) but it is certainly not immediately obvious, and I liked the shape it made.

Week 3 was pattern-matching. This means you have to cut and piece in such a way that you re-create the pattern on the original fabric. This is tricky, and is not really my favourite type of focus cutting. I decided against matching across all 7 pieces, and instead matched 3 pairs of 2 half-hexies.

This still gives an interesting effect. I would like to try matching all 6 half-hexies so that they make a cool frame around the central hexie, but none of my grey and yellow fabrics leant themselves to this effect. I am hoping that I will be able to do this in a future month, as there is going to be a pattern-matching week most months this year.

Week 4 was freestyle. Having not been inspired by the colour combo initially, by now I had got into it, and I had 5 different blocks I wanted to make.  However, I was not going to realistically find the time for that, so I made 2 blocks.

The grey block with the yellow trees uses a fabric I won in a giveaway during the first of these sewalongs in 2018. It also featured in the 2019 blocks.

The yellow block uses Aldi fabric for the stripes (Aldi has produced a lot of decent focus cutting fabrics over the past few years) and the central fox hexie is in fact leftover from another project - a scrappy rainbow I-spy hexie quilt that I have finished piecing, but still need to applique on the border and quilt.

The fox fabric was originally sent to me for use in that project by someone on Instagram through the annual 'Get Your Quilty Wishes Granted' scheme, which is a sort of pay-it-forward scheme in which you put your 'wishes' on Instagram and check the other people joining in to send them something from your own stash. It's a lovely, generous community.

So there we go! Six January blocks. It's a great start to the year from a quilty perspective, and I am hoping to keep this level of productivity up, despite lockdown etc. February's theme is going to be 'Getting to Know You' which again I don't find particularly inspiring. I prefer the more specific themes like colours and animals, to the very generalised ones. But maybe I will change my mind again once I get into it.

Thanks for reading!