I just ordered some beautiful kaleidoscope blocks and fans and wonder if anyone has experience sewing with these.

I am eager to make something special and different for my daughter for Christmas and have ordered both blocks and fans as well as some of the matching background material.

Looking for wisdom and ideas from the more experienced. Maybe I have bitten off more than I should as a relatively new quilter. :oops:

Is this a kit that you bought?

Yep they are a kit. I bought them from a seller on Ebay called "country_cottage_treasures". I am in love with the peach colored rose ones.

I copied this description from their page:

"No tedious layering or cutting. Your quilt top is ready to stitch! Each block measures approx. 8" square when stitched and each block in the set will be uniquely different due to layering the fabric in exact repeats. No two will be the same. This kit contains 72 precut pieces that will produce 6 quilt blocks. Matching corners from the Bella Collection are included." The Bella collection is from Moda.

I was thinking of making attic windows around the different blocks. I have also bought a sheet of sayings about daughters that I hope to intersperse in the different windows too.

I want to know if there is a trick to putting these things together so they look nice that I may not know about, actually I am sure I do NOT know about the tricks all the seasoned quilters have up their sleeves.

maybe you could post pictures when you get the kit and then we can see exactly what you are working with :wink:

The kit probably says to use 1/4" seams, and that will be critical to your success. Test to be sure you're sewing 1/4" seams. There's a tutorial. Look under Main - Tutorials, p. 2 " ShelleyQ - Beginner Blocks #1: the 9-Patch and Variants" Scroll down - there's a section on how to test yourself to see if you're sewing a perfect 1/4" seam - WITH PICTURES!

Thee is another tute here also on the fan blocks, thanks for the remider Joanne!!!

http://www.quiltingboard.com/posts/list/15094.page

Thanks for posting this Amma. I bookmarked it. It's good advice for ANY block that has pieces with bias or off-grain edges - cutting one of the edges on straight-of-grain makes SO much sense!