All That Improv

After surviving the year-long process of piecing my improv slab quilt, it seemed logical to gather all my individual blocks in one place and take note of the tutorials I used. Much credit goes to Matt Macomber/@odditease for planning the BOM and providing us with tutorials or at least suggestions on how to get started. So here's the rundown, with my added comments thrown in now and then:

One. Strings

• Improv string block tutorial by Penny/sewtakeahike

Two. Triangles

• Ants to Sugar's Little Tents 
• Improv Stripped Geese by Little Ms. Sew-Unsew
• My experiment continued with half-square triangles, half-rectangle triangles, and tall and skinny. I especially like the scrappy ones in the upper left, using my string scraps from last month.

Three. Gentle curves

• Gentle improv curves by Anne/Play Crafts on Lily’s Quilts

Four. Crazy-piecing

• Free-piece fabric making from Victoria Findlay Wolfe 

Five. Squares

• In Matt's words, "I cut a variety of squares from my fabrics, joined the squares into pairs, joined those pairs of squares into four patch units, and then assembled those four patch units into the slab."
• My process ended up being similar to how Amanda Jean/crazy mom quilts begins her Scrap Vortex quilt.

Six. Pineapples

• Jacquie Gering's tutorial, which includs a 'half log cabin' variation, shown in the right half of my slab, as well as the full block, on the left.

Seven. Quarter circles

• Improv curved quilt blocks from Lindsay Conner on Craftsy
• I also have often refered to Leanne/she can quilt's tutorial for Improv Circles.

Eight. Churn dash

• This month we got to choose our own block, and I very roughly referenced Leanne/she can quilt's "liberated piecing" technique to create my Churn Dash blocks.
• Also see the Modernized Churn Dash tutorial by Jenifer/42 Quilts.

Nine. Hourglass

• Another 'choose your own' month, I really winged it on this one, and then wrote my own Improv Hourglass tutorial.

Ten: Spikes

• It was in Gwen Marston's Liberated Quiltmaking II that I found Improv Spikes, the blocks that tied my quilt together.
• Also see the Spike Border tutorial from Mary/Molly Flanders... Maker... and Pendants by Jenifer/42 Quilts.

So there's a handy little round-up of improv quilt block tutorials to get you experimenting on your own. Have fun!