Pinwheel Scrap Quilt

I have a hard time letting go of any fabric scraps over about a quarter yard!  But my fabric closet was close to explosion and when I got it cleaned out, the culprits were all the larger scraps I saved over the last 10 years.  The closet now looks great and the scraps sat in a heap on the guest bed waiting for me to have some sort of inspiration on what to do with them.

Thinking that sorting might help, I put them into smaller piles by color - it worked!  Looking at the kaleidoscope of colors reminded me of pinwheels .... what about a pinwheel scrap quilt?  My first thought was to use a rainbow of colors, but after looking at the huge pile of black fabrics I decided to go with black and white with a few red pinwheel squares thrown in for pop.

I made piles of 4 1/2 squares ....

.... and began sewing.  To make a pinwheel square, place a solid color square (I'm using white) on the right side of a scrap square.  Draw a line from one point to the point opposite.

Sew 1/4 inch on each side of the line.

Cut down the line and press open.

Line up the sewn squares like below.  Sew the top two squares together and then the bottom two squares.

Sew the two rectangles you've just made together and trim edges to make a 7 1/2 inch square.

And that's where I am - busily sewing more and more pinwheel squares while thinking about all the different ways I can put them together to make the quilt top!  And thinking about what other pinwheel quilts I can make with the other scraps ...

Happy Creating!  Deborah