wow what a neat idea be sure to show the finished quilts!!!

Your organization is wonderful.... I can see lots of us QB quilters following your style. I love I-spy quilts as well but haven't done any lately. I think you might have inspired me to start collecting again. I'll have to see what I have already.

And, don't forget to show us your finished product..... can hardly wait.

I love to look at the Ispy quilts and can't wait to see all the fabrics you collected.

a lot of work for sure. show us when they are done.

Oh, wow, good luck with your project.

Great project!
I'm putting together an I-Spy Bowtie--lots of fun. :)

What a ton of work but they sure look great all stacked up on the table.:thumbup:

WOW, you've got an assembly line going!!!!

Great job! I don't know if I'd be that patient.

Thanks for all the encouragement everyone! I would like to start on one of the quilts this weekend, but found out today that my plans may have changed - I'll know tomorrow whether I have to make a road trip this weekend. As soon as I get one done I will post for sure though.

To answer some questions:

We will be using the squares as is - no hexes, although that might be fun for the next set.

The layout is indeed 10 by 13 blocks. That will give us a top that is 45 by 58.5. It's a good size to go up through school age. We may put borders on them also, but won't know until we see what a top looks like put together.

We don't plan on selling any. We need five or six quilts (I've lost count) in the next three months or so. Those will be the first, and we will keep the kits in reserve for the next several baby quilts we need.

I am happy with how the kits are organized now, but I have learned a couple of things. If I do this again, I will make it even easier on myself. This time we collected the fabrics, then started cutting when we had enough. I would cut a half yard into three 5" strips (plus a 2.5" strip if I could get it). Then I would stack those 5" strips and cut them into squares, and put those 24 squares into groups of ten fabrics. Then I had to "shuffle" all those stacks into kits. Next time I will cut the fabrics in groups of three as soon as I bring them home, stacking a 5" strip of each fabric together and cutting that group into squares, and assemble the 24 kits as I cut. The cutting and kit assembly was murder on my back because I did it all at once. I have a new respect for the people who organize swaps!

Some of the fabrics we bought ended up having a pattern that was too big to be cut into a 5" square. We thought we were being careful when we bought, but I still had to reject about 6 or 7 fabrics because they wouldn't make good 5" squares. Next time we will be even more careful about pattern size. I may even cut myself a 4.5" frame to take shopping with us.

I think we have been collecting the fabrics for 3 or 4 years. It would be quite expensive to try to purchase all of this at once ($650 if the fabric averaged $10 per yard). If I could buy fat quarters I would do that, but some places don't sell them, which is why we started on half yards.

After talking about them so much now I think I will go out and start laying out a quilt. Wish me luck!