Blorange Blocks

In my stash I had a jelly-roll type assortment of 2½" wide strips made from American Jane fabrics. There were 24 strips equally divided between 12 orange strips and 12 blue strips. I decided to repeat a block quilt like the one I made in teals and described in my post for 1/4/25 and my post for 1/20/25. Making this quilt in 6" finished blocks from WOF 2½" wide strips, there is very little waste and so it is becoming a favorite of mine for consuming color coordinated jelly rolls. Each blue/orange pair of WOF strips makes four blocks. The quartets are outlined in a following photo.

The blue and orange color combination was very familiar to me, but initially I could not quite place why. Yes, per color theory this combination is named complementary, since blue and orange are on opposite sides of the color wheel. Still, something else was niggling at me. Then I remembered. One of my grandsons, in his toddler years was a Blippi fan, and those are Blippi's signature colors. My grandson has aged beyond Blippi, so I missed my window in making this quilt for him. Sigh. Grandchildren's preferences do not always align with my current stash. On the bright side, that circumstance provides a valuable excuse for buying more fabric! But back to this quilt. Its disposition is undecided. I may donate it for a community quilt. There may be a toddler out there somewhere who is a Blippi fan.

Balancing by placing the more strikingly different blocks near the edges, — the zippers, alphabet, and multi-color floral, as examples — this is the final block arrangement and joining. Blocks measures 6", so top is 36" x 48". Should I add a border? Yes, a border would make binding easier to apply and more stable. Though I needed to be careful that the needed backing did not exceed one WOF.  The border I added would be narrow, actually more a divider than a border. 

I did not want an orange or blue border since either color would blend in with about half the blocks. There are blocks that have a hint of yellow in them: the zippers, the pansies, and the ovals. I decided that a narrow yellow border would be a nice break from blue and orange and hint at the cheerful yellow tidbits scattered within these few blocks. I opted for a pin dot, low-volume orange fabric for the binding. I chose orange for the binding since that yellow narrow border would act as a buffer.

The pieced backing echoes the blue and orange vibe and keeps with the blocks theme. Both of these fabrics are from the American Collection by Sandy Klop. 

For the FMQ I repeated the "circles" I did on my shades-of-teal baby block quilt, post for 1/20/25. I stitched the curves one arc at a time (one fourth of a circle) using my HQ Half Circle Templates. I used the outer edge of the 8" half-circle with a ½" echo foot, forcing the arcs to hit at the corners of the 6" squares. In the yellow border I stitched a row of half circles using the clamshell ruler from Handi-Quilter. The photo of the rulers has red stars indicating what portion I used. Actually both of these rulers are the older HQ designs. The newer rulers are different. 

In going back and looking at the post for the teal blocks quilt, I noticed I am really more fond of yellow than I am aware. So fond in fact, I elected to execute my FMQ in a cheery yellow thread. The white in the block fabric is a rather cream tone. Blue or orange would have shown up on half the blocks and disappeared on the other half. Note to self: I am getting braver; seems like now I want my quilting to show up. The following photos are closeups of the quilting in the blocks and the quilting in the outer yellow border.

I made labels as I usually do, with my initials, the year of completion, and the quilt name. I opted for Blorange, a blend of blue and orange. I considered Blippi Blorange , or perhaps even Blippi Blorange Blocks (cringe?),  but thought the character Blippi might go out of recognition. Either of those names would have been kind of anyway and also a mouthful to say. Simply Blorange it is.

Blorange finished at 38" wide and 50" tall. Here are views of the front and back. It really gives me a happy vibe just to look at it.