Thank you for all the kind replies. I appreciate it more than you know.
I have had several PM's asking for the pattern for the first quilt, (bricks with black sashing).
Board member GingerK made up the pattern. Following are her instructions:
It is 7x2 inch pieces separated by 1 inch black sashing and then 1/4 inch (or so, I think it ended up being more like 3/8") black sashing between rows. In this case it was all about colour placement. I had 5 shades of 6 colours--30 different fabrics. Keeping it all straight was a bit challenging at times!
How I did it: I decided on the length of my 'brick' plus 1/2 inch. I cut that measurement across the width of the fabric. I then sewed an 1 1/2 inch strip of black to it and then sub-cut to the width I wanted.
The layout IS vertical. On the first row, you lay your bricks with the 'mortar' (the black sashing) on the bottom. On the next row, you lay the bricks with the mortar on the top. Because I had a distinct colour placement, I ended up first graphing the colours and then laying everything out on my dining room floor and THEN pinning each row, brick by brick by brick, and walking each row to my sewing machine.
Once I had the vertical rows sewed, I sewed a 3/4 inch (or so, I think it ended up being a wee bit wider) to one side of the first row. When I sewed the next row to it, I made sure that I sewed in the OPPOSITE direction. That kept the vertical strips from getting skewed--what happens when you sew all the seams in the same direction. It was easy to remember--just keep the black on the top. BTW I did cut the black from the length of the fabric, which made it very stable. I also cut it to the proper length and took the time to mark the distances where each piece of sashing should be. Again, I wanted everything as square as possible--with 30 different kinds of fabric, some are going to stretch more than others and I did not want to deal with that!!
Finally, I put a 4 inch border of black all the way around--again cut from the length of the fabric.
Elise