I was in a rush to finish one more block for my June goals. So naturally I picked an advanced difficulty one.

This one had tan swirl fabric pieces adjoining tan swirl fabric pieces, which called for lighter thread on some of the seams, and also a little bit of extra attention when cutting things out.

I fussy-cut one swirl in the middle of each of the smaller pieces. There was less wiggle room with the larger pieces, but I did attempt to cut them so no swirls would be chopped in half at the seams.

Once I cut out all the pieces, I was ready to start stitching.

The block is essentially a diamond in a square in a diamond in a square … and the diamond in a square pattern has to some extent been my nemesis.

Sure enough, the first/inner set of triangles went on just fine, but when I tried to attach the second/pieced set of triangles, nothing was lining up.

After ripping out all my stitching, I tried another approach. I printed out the block outline and measured the finished size of the inner diamond in a square. It turns out my inner diamond in a square section was a full 1/8″ larger than it was supposed to be.

So I remarked the stitching lines, and proceeded to attach the pieced set of triangles with more success.

But then I measured the resulting diamond, and it was also bigger than it was supposed to be. And this one wasn’t even “equally” bigger so that I could just adjust each side by the same amount.

To correct the sizing issues, I ended up measuring from the center of the block outward on each side. Some of the marked stitching lines were spot-on, and some of them were almost 1/8″ inch too big.

With the new stitching lines, however, the third/final set of triangles (yes, technically two of them aren’t triangles) fit just fine.

On the topic of swirls, you may remember that I basted about half of my blue swirls quilt at Spring Retreat. I was planning to baste the second half at Fall Retreat, but then my awesome new Barnett quilting hoop arrived and I just could not wait for months before trying it out.

Since I’m now officially too old to crawl around on the hardwood floor basting quilts, I set up this basting station in the garage, putting two folding tables end-to-end:

It was not ideal basting conditions, but was worth the effort when I got to try out my new hoop for the first time:

Much as I want to spend all my time with my new hoop, I’ve got more Dear Jane blocks to make. On to the next one!