Occasionally I put down my gel pen and Rhodia dot pad and pick up Excel instead: it’s easy to make a grid, and quick to fill cells with a range of colours.

I’ve been playing with stars and stripes this week.

I could create a diagonal edge between the two colours, but I kinda like the blunt, squared edge of the dominant blue stripe. Then again, angled ends at the outer edges of the stars might look nicer.

The easiest way to construct this pattern would probably be to modify common blocks: log cabins and courthouse steps. Around the outside, quarter log cabins could be created by using a large central square (in white) and adding pinky/peach and dark blue stripes to two sides only. Each stripe would need an extra bit of white at its end to make it span the length of the block. The inside 4 blocks in the above design could be made using the courthouse steps block, again with a central white square surrounded by coloured stripes (each with a bit of extra white at the ends). It’s a bit easier to picture what I mean by looking only at those central 4 blocks:

Each quadrant is the same block, rotated by 90 degrees. Such a simple design, but a great opportunity for some striking colour combinations or scrappy fabrics.