Quilt 2: Ohio Star (design)

I'm originally from Ohio, so I thought it would be nice to use the block pattern "Ohio Star" in my next design. The star block pattern I know as Ohio Star is actually known by several other names as well. I did some research to try and discover how it came to be named but wasn't able to find out much about the history of this pattern. I only know it's been around quite a while, and there are many examples of it found in museums (such as this one: Antique Ohio Star).

I wanted to make this one a very simple design, with just the star blocks done in a single print on a contrasting background. I designed my first quilt using an Excel spreadsheet, but found Excel just was too difficult to work with when I wanted to show blocks with triangles in them. For this quilt I pulled out my copy of Microsoft Visio (diagramming software). It worked fairly well, and here's the resulting sample:

This design features thirty 12" Ohio Star blocks, separated by 2" edges (using the background fabric). Then alternating border strips of the gold and maroon fabrics, with a maroon binding.

Now to calculate the yardage needed.

YIKES! My Achilles heel...

I am absolutely embarrassed by the amount of leftover fabric from my first project - as I grossly over-estimated what would be required. I really didn't want to make that same mistake.

I also wanted to go with better fabric this time. For that first project I paid about $12 a meter for the fabric. That sounds like a lot of money, but the fact is that fabric just wasn't top quality. I knew that this time I'd be paying between $20-25 per meter. At those prices you really don't want a lot of waste. But - and here's the sticky thing - you don't want to buy too little, and then end up stuck when you go back for more fabric and find that it's been sold out.

So yesterday afternoon I drove to "Patchwork" - a quilting shop in Tecoma and chatted with Lesley (one of the owners). She was immensely helpful. I spotted the maroon fabric right off, but felt less confident selecting the contrasting gold. Lesley reached right over and grabbed a perfect print - no hesitation. Here they are:

Both fabrics are manufactured by Moda.

Vital Statistics:

• the gold is "Garden Party" by Blackbird Designs for Moda (Pattern # 2655) 43" wide.
• the maroon is Civil War Homefront by Barbara Brackman for Moda (Pattern #8155 "Poke Salad" 140-1865) 43" wide.

Both prints have a marvelous "rich" feel to them.

I bought enough to get the stars made and the first border (gold). I decided to postpone buying the remaining border and binding fabric until I've finished the star blocks. If the shop doesn't have these prints when I'm ready to buy the rest it won't matter. They have such a huge selection that I'm really not worried about finding something suitable.

As soon as I got home I threw the material into the washer and then the dryer to pre-shrink and wash out any sizing. So the pre-washing is done and the panels are neatly pressed.

Ready now to start cutting!