Monday, November 3, 2014

ONE BLOCK WONDER

I wish I were in love with this quilt.  I am not.  It includes my favorite colors but I don't like Christmas fabric.  True, I selected it.  I was going for a twenty four inch repeat and the price was right.  When the piece arrived, I found that it has a twelve inch repeat. According to the book, a twenty four inch repeat is ideal.  I could have cut twice the strips, but I chose to make a throw.  Mostly I wanted to experiment with this pattern. 


There is no straight edge when you work with hexagons. Your choice: remove a half hexagon or add a half hexagon to fill in the open spaces along the edge.  I chose to fill in the spaces.  Thus,  the very edge, every other row, has no match.   Follow the rows and you can see the pattern in each block.  I think this quilt might have benefited from some half triangles in between each block.  Too late now.

As I was about to piece the fourth column to the first three, I noticed a mistake. Luckily,  I only had to  partially rip out the seam between the BA strip and the A strip.  I then had to remove the  B and A hexagons from the rest of that strip and flip them around.  WHEW.


There is another mistake. It is subtle and I did not fix it. Since I don't throw up when I look at it, I figure it isn't that bad.  But I do wish that I had noticed it before piecing.  


Border decision time.  I will add half triangles to the top and bottom to create a straight edge.  I think that I will have to use green.  I hope I have something that will match.  Then I plan to sew on a narrow, white border.  I think that the outer border will be a some of the original fabric.  No getting around it,  this is a Christmas quilt. 




UPDATE:
When adding the half triangles, it is helpful to know that this is the plan ahead of time.  That way, you can sew the half triangles to the hexagons before sewing them into strips.  I learned the hard way.



6 comments:

  1. When I look at the first photo and read what you still plan to do with the borders, I am thinking this is going to be a really pretty quilt when quilted. I was unsure at first since it has so much going on. I am loving these quilts you are cranking out.

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    1. I am still unsure. Updates after the borders are complete.

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  2. Nice quilt, another way to do that pesky tumbling block pattern. Can't wait to see the finished product.

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  3. Sorry - but this is way too busy for me - looks like something my grannie would have made (and I'm 61!) - but you just don't know until you try. I haven't made any Christmas quilts yet ( have an aversion since I got married 17th December 1988 and wanted to exclude Christmas from my wedding, and then when we got to the registry office there was a Christmas tree!) I do however like certain Christmas fabrics with gold and stars on as long as they are not too Christmassy! :0)

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    1. Me too. But once I start something I must finish.

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