Daddy's Tie

The fourth and final block for Jackson's quilt is Daddy's Tie - this is such an easy block to put together - one liberated braid surrounded by the feature fabric. The inspiration for this block came from Jacquie over at Tallgrass Prairie Studio - she has a great tutorial on her blog this week for her chevron technique.

Why Daddy's Tie - because it reminds me of a tie. My first go round with the braid included dots, but I thought they made the braid a bit too busy so I decided to stick with solids - they work in the tie!
Sewing a liberated braid is so simple. I started with a heap of strips cut to 1'', 1 1/4'' and 1 1/2''. This photo was taken before I decided to omit the dotted fabric.
This is a liberated braid - no measuring - free styling piecing! Get started with two pieces of fabric and stitch them together. I was cutting my pieces about 4 inches long.
Stitch the next piece of fabric perpendicular to the first seam.
And that is as complicated as it gets! For my tie I selected 6 fabrics - 2 green, 2 orange, and 2 turquoise. I staggered the placement of like fabric so they would not show up on the same side of the braid - look closely at the braid below - the placement of green stripe strip alternates sides.
I had 3 blocks to make (a total of 4 for the quilt - I made my sample block earlier) so I decided to make one long braid - cutting it to size later. Look under my presser foot - see the piece of dottie fabric - - - that's my little pillow. I use it so I can chain stitch my braid. I sew through the pillow first, then keep stitching through the block seam. When I finish the block seam I sew another pillow at the end, then snip off my block, leaving the second pillow under the needle.
Snip off the attached pillow - and repeat. It saves so much thread.
I sewed and sewed until my braid measured about a yard in length. To cut the braid down to size - 2 1/2'' wide - I located the center at or about where the strips meet in the center. Trim one side first, then trim the opposite side - creating a strip measuring 2 1/2'' wide. Then cut into 3 strips 10 1/2'' in length.
Voila!

To finish the Daddy's Tie block cut one strip of focus fabric 2 1/2'' wide x 10 1/2'' long for the left side.Cut another piece of fabric measuring 61/2'' wide x 10 1/2'' long - I fussy cut this piece so that the turquoise giraffe was in the center. Piece the sections together for a 10 1/2'' square block.
Tomorrow - time to put our four blocks together!