Oh my goodness, how I love Leslie. So glad she's here to make your logging
easier. She's so right about: cut your strips to exact lengths so you'll
know every time that your logs are staying true and even. If you place a
strip and it's not crossing TWO seams, you're in the wrong place. Thread on
the bobbin is not optional.
Mary's log cabin tells you that you do NOT have to be limited to solids.
Prints, patterns, plaids (if you dare) are so much more interesting.
Polly

"Leslie& The Furbabies in MO." ...
I've made probably twenty log cabin tops. It's my 'go to' pattern when I
want to do a quickie top.

I use a 12 in. finished block with logs that finish at either 1 in. or
1.25 in. wide. I actually prefer the looks of a 1.25 in. finished log. I
draw out the block, figure the dimensions of each log and make a test
block to prove my measurements. Then I cut all the logs at once- cutting
8-12 thickness of fabric at a time... using a brand new rotary blade in my
45 mm cutter, of course! First cut the strips then cut the lengths to
size. Cutting that many layers at once is not for the faint of heart and
requires concentration and lots of muscle- you do NOT want to make a
mistake in measurements nor let your rotary cutter run amok!

Some folks sew each round of the blocks to a long strip of fabric and then
cut the blocks off the strip- rather than cutting the strip of fabric into
sections for each round of logs. I don't like that long strip method
because if you get off size on something then you don't know until all the
blocks are done and they are all over the place in size. If you pre-cut
the logs and they don't fit together correctly you know some thing is
wrong and you can fix it before the error starts multiplying itself.
Also, after the first few rounds of adding logs to the block, you always
add the next log on the side where you stitch across two seams. Only ONE
side of the block will have two seams, so you cannot get confused on where
to add the next log if you keep that in mind.

I had making log cabin tops down to a science- years ago I could start
with pulling fabrics from my stash, cut, sew and assemble the queen sized
top in fourteen hours working straight thru! Polly refers to the time I
was sewing the last round of logs on 120 log cabin blocks. I finished the
last log on the last block at 4 a.m.- after working on them all day and
night. I went to fish the chained blocks out from behind the sewing
machine and found out I'd run out of bobbin thread on the second block and
had 118 logs sewn to the blocks with no bobbin thread.

I cried.....