Tessellating Stars

Today is December 1 and my block is Tessellating Star. This is one of my favorite patterns and I've made it into quilts several times. Here is the calendar block (with "tessellating" misspelled, but not by me!)

Kathy M. (one of my faithful Calendar Girls) made her block using the Find Your Way fabrics from Benartex:

Tessellating Star by Kathy M - 12"

Here's the block as it appeared in my first perpetual calendar, stitched by Patricia Bryant:

12" Tessellating Star by Patricia Bryant

Now let's see a few of the quilts I've made over the past 25 years! The first one was a challenge because I wanted each star to be a different fabric/print:. (Yes, the only photo was in my magazine). I remember distinctly placing each of the quarter blocks up on my design wall in my home when I lived in Silver Spring, Maryland!

Multi-colored Tessellating Stars

But, what really does "tessellating" mean? We think of the artist M. C. Escher and all his wonderful INTERLOCKING designs. Yes, tessellating means interlocking!

Here's what I mean by interlocking with a different pattern which we saw here in October - Ozark Maple Leaves. Notice that the gold blocks interlock with the green blocks.

Ozark Maple Leaves - October 7 block

Tessellating Leaves shows up a few more times:

Four Block Tessellating Leaves from 2004

And a larger quilt which appeared in my first book Bold, Black and Beautiful (AQS 2004). Two prints.

Autumn Tessellating Leaves: 58" x 58"

And 5 blocks, which got tricky to arrange! Donated to my local quilt guild's charity endeavors.

And 6 blocks with six different solid reading colors and a constant background print:

More Tessellating Stars (or are these leaves?)

One more using 5 blocks

5 blocks with the illusion of seven!

And one last one I'm currently finishing up. It is made using the Equinox Collection by Benartex. Can you see the one renegade star at the top? Didn't want to be pale cream - pumped up the yellow! (but didn't get to be gold like the other two).

16 Block Tessellating Stars quilt center

Check your local quilt shop for my calendar so you can have your own Tessellating Star block.

You can find my calendar here, also:

on Amazon

at C&T Publishing

and in Barnes & Noble stores