Made some serious progress today :)

We have three more strip sets to QAYG on the top half, and then it's poly pellet time! (The cat wrings his paws with glee)

Press seam open, pin down next strip, and QAYG

Again... we sewed two strip sets (right sides together) to the backing. We folded open the strip sets, pressed open the seam, smoothed down the newly exposed strip set, and then lined up another strip set on top of the strip set we just pressed open, again right sides together.
This post might be out of order, but it might not be, LOL. It's the same thing that we're doing with every seam at this stage...

Roll it up and sew!

We rolled up both ends of the quilt backing so only the area to be stitched was visible. The less bulk to manage, the better.

Then starting at the bottom (the end we were NOT starting the stitching at) we rolled the whole thing up. Then we sewed our seam, unrolling as we went.
This is Quilting As You Go because the quilting is both the seams holding the strip sets in place, and the seams we sew the poly pellets into the strip sets with, as opposed to adding quilting after the quilt is done... which we couldn't do anyhow over the poly pellets without breaking needles/making massive messes...

A big step! Cutting tubes, preparing to sew to backing

This is where we need to really pay attention and go slow. Here the time needed to correct mistakes increases exponentially...AMHIK*
We need 7 tubes.
Each tube is composed of two strip sets sewn together - one strip set of each color combination, with a 4.5"X10" end block of the matching color sewn onto each end.
Each tube has two strip sets and four blocks. This makes more sense if you look at the picture. You can't see the blue/water strip set sewn onto the other side of the starry blue/white strip set, but it's there.
We will be cutting the tubes in a staggered manner so that when they are laid out, they will form our pattern.

Here's the method of our tube-cutting madness:


I have a 12"X18" cutting mat that I put inside each tube, in order to cut through just one side or layer of the tube. 
I cut through the solid blue strip sets with the water strip in the middle (NOT the starry blue strip sets with the white strip down the middle).
Tube #1 was cut in the middle of the solid blue half of the tube.
Tube #1 is no longer a tube - it is cut strip set #1. It will be pinned and sewn to the middle of the backing, and the other cut strip sets staggered from there. 
Tube #2 was cut 4" from the center of the solid blue side of the tube (not the starry side). #2 is no longer a tube, but cut strip set #2. Repeat...
Tube #3 was cut 8" from the center of the solid blue side of the tube (and is now cut strip set #3), and
Tube #4 was cut 12" from the center of the solid blue side of the tube (and is now cut strip set #4).
We basically will do the same with cut strip sets #5, #6 and #7, with the measurements matching #2, #3, and #4.
I squared up the edges (trimmed them with the rotary cutter so they are even). Feeding the OCS monster again :)

*ask me how I know