Waste Not

I get excited when I see the possibilities in fabric bits that others might consider waste.  

Depending on their size, I like to play with triangle cut-offs.

At a fall retreat, we were given kits to make blocks for the Cluck Cluck Sew pattern, "No-point Stars".  In this pattern, the stars in the blocks are created using "Triangle Corners" or "Diagonal Corners" (A small square is placed in the corner of a larger square.  After you sew on the diagonal of the small square, the corner is trimmed away and the remaining small triangle is pressed to the outside.)

For these stars, 3" squares were placed on top of 4" squares.  The leftover trimmed corner was large enough to sew a 1/4" seam and finish with a decent size half square triangle square. 

Because 3" squares were placed on adjoining corners of the 4" squares, there was an unexpected result using some of the half square triangle squares to make pinwheel blocks!  (See the small pinwheel in the center of the square on the left?)

The binding for one of my prayer quilts was made from striped fabric.  I joined strips of the fabric using  diagonal seams.  Instead of throwing away the seam trimmings, I decided to stitch them to scrap squares of white fabric.  Pinwheels from these triangle trimmings turned out fun, too!

 

Often I will find random triangles in scrap bags that are given to me.  As I did with the striped triangles, I will stitch these to scraps of background fabric, then cut them out and trim to size.  

What will I do with these little blocks?  Right now I have a basket in which I put little blocks that I have either made or inherited.  My vision is that someday, they will be made into a sampler quilt.  TBD  :)  In the meantime, it is definitely fun to play!