So June has been a crazy month.  If you want to know what I have been up to you can check out this post by Living Room Real Estate… here is a hint… it involves fabric and kids…

But in between classes I have manged to get some sewing done… and have spent my precious free hours this week finishing my Quilts for Pulse quilt top (which I will blog this week I promise) and testing blocks for the Do Good Stitches bee.  This month I am setting the block for the group and I finally decided on this beauty…

The pattern is a free pattern from Cloud Nine called The Amsterdam Quilt.
The pattern is for 12 of these flowers but I need my Bee members to make just two of the flowers, so I have broken down the pattern to outline making just one flower so here goes…

For one flower you will need:

Two (2) x 4 1/2 inch squares for the top of the flower
One (1) x 4 1/2 inch by 8 1/2 inch rectangle for the bottom of the flower
Two (2) x 5 inch green squares for the leaves
Two (2) x 5 inch squares of white for the background
Two (2) x 2 1/2 inch white squares for the flower top
Two (2) x 2 inch white squares for the bottom edges of the flower
One (1) x 1 inch by 8 inch brown rectangle for the stem

Construction is pretty simple.  I started by marking a diagonal line down the middle of all the white squares using my trusty Frixon pen…

The squares will form the corners of the flower top and bottom.  You need to make sure that you are making a mirror image when you sew them to the flower top pieces and the bottom section…

I then sewed down my marked line..actually I sew just a hairs width on the outside of the line as it seems to give me a more accurate corner…

The top piece is then completed by sewing the two 4 1/2 inch squares together to create a white V in the center of the top…

I then used the same technique to sew the 2 inch squares to the bottom of the flower section..  Then onto the leaves, where you are making four (4) half square triangles using the green and white 5 inch squares…

There is quite a bit of wiggle room with the HST’s so you can easily trim them to  4 1/4 inches square.

You end up with four half square triangles that are then sewn together to make the leave sections..  The flower pieces then go together quickly and easily, as per the instruction sheet.

For my Bee flowers I have requested bright/jewel coloured flowers.  I want the flowers to be bright and happy and I have limited each flower to one busy novelty print and one more graphic colour as I did not want the flowers to be too insane… it was hard as I love my novelty prints but top and bottom busy novelty prints was just a little too much for even me!

I think this is going to be an fabulously bright and cheerful quilt when done.  I love how easy to make these blocks were…and just warning they are a little addictive.