Star Light Star Bright {Shooting for the Stars with Island Batik}

I'm not on the blog hop schedule this month for Island Batik (but make sure to check out the other posts!) so I am tasked with making a star-themed project this month!

This month I am going to be making a wall hanging or throw sized version of one of our original Honey, Bunny, and Doll patterns -- Starbursts!

If you've followed me for a long while, you might remember that Starbursts was our first-ever quilt along! My original quilt (above) is a twin-ish sized quilt, and I made a mini quilt during my first year as an Island Batik Ambassador that just used one of the blocks repeated four times.

This time around, I will be making the wall hanging/throw size version -- this version utilizes nine blocks, one each of the designs included in the pattern. The throw size is not set on point like the twin sized version.

For the fabrics, I am going to be using the Sand Bar line that I received in my latest Island Batik Ambassador box. As an Island Batik Ambassador, I am provided with samples of various lines of Island Batik fabrics to use and share with you!

The light blue Cheerios print will be my background fabric and I will be using the dark navy print for the eight star points in each block. I will use the 2.5" strips for the majority of the piecing, mixing in the half yard cuts for any of the piecing where I might need pieces larger than 2.5" wide.

Here's one of my favorite paper piecing tips: it can be helpful to pin your first piece of fabric to your paper foundation to provide some stability until you start sewing to the foundation.

Here's my first block:

I used 2.5" strips for all of the piecing with the exception of the center square and the background.

I absolutely love to paper piece, but I know a lot of people struggle with this technique -- so leave your burning paper piecing questions in the comments and I will try to answer some of them (with pictures!) over my next few posts.

Happy Monday! Get your own copy of Starbursts on Etsy!