Manx Log Cabin Quilt Block by Machine: A New Project

I've been wanting to work on a Manx Log Cabin block and I finally worked up the "test" or sample block. Sample blocks are always useful because 

1. It lets me know if I can stand to work on whatever technique is at hand. 
2. It also give me a sample block to look at while I'm working through the rest of the blocks.

 

 

• For this particular block, there was something about the center that doesn't work.  I chose blue in contrast to the red and cream logs.  But the first log is a dark red and it fights with the blue log of the same shape and size and depth of color.  I should have picked one of the pinkier colors for that spot. Lesson learned! 

 Turning a Hand-Sewn Manx Quilt Block into Machine-Sewn by Timothy Totten.

The Manx quilt block was developed by Celtic people living on the Isle of Man, where they reused every scrap of fabric that they could.   They would use the span of their hands, and the length of their thumb to measure fabric for these blocks--so every quilt was unique to the maker.    Although I love the look of these blocks, I'm not so keen on hand-sewing, so I was happy to see this version for doing it by machine and using 2-1/2 strips from jelly rolls.

The logs are sewn and flipped / folded in such a way as to leave a little tuck (for lack of a better word).  I love the 3D nature of this technique!  You could fiddle with and play with the pockets as you are falling asleep ...

 

Here is the foundation fabric.  You have to press some guidelines into it to keep all the logs straight.  

I have already placed the center block, aligned with the diaganals, ready for the logs.  

Here are the jelly rolls I'm using.  The raspberry strips are from Nanna's Creations on Etsy and the cream is a light batik jelly roll.  I'm going to have to look for something to use for the backing blocks.  For this one, I just used a square cut from an old sheet -- which I guess is in keeping with traditional Manx quilts to reuse whatever they had.  You don't have to be precise about cutting the logs perfectly with this method either, but I wanted to keep it simple by using the 2-1/2 inch width jelly rolls.

There is no batting in these, so they are considered "light" summer quilts. With the folds, they can get kind of heavy.  We'll see if I get going on this sooner than later ...  I'll have to decide if I want to chain piece a project like this or do 1 block at a time.  Yet to be decided!

I also bought jelly rolls to do a purple and gray set as well.  If everything goes well, I may be on a Manx Log Cabin (Jelly) Roll for a while ...