Hey there! Glad to have you back for more Tending Grandma P’s Flower Garden – yay for English Paper Piecing and handwork!! If you missed the first post, check it out here.
As I mentioned before, I have tried where possible to assembly line this project. I don’t want to enjoy the journey so slowly that I discover I need more fabric when it’s gone. Even with my limited experiences I’ve already enjoyed that outcome more than I care to think about. (Just last month as a matter of fact… the below is my older son’s birthday present, and yes- there are two different black batiks in there. Oops)
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The Fabric and Tools
To recap, I’ve now compiled the fabric (Northcott, Hopelessly Romantic) and tools for this Quilt It List project, and cut my hexies. I think the thing I like most about EPP is the portable nature of it – I did more than a fair share of this stuff sitting in the car.
True story
I started out by gluing my fabric to my 1” hexagon forms and storing them in Ziploc bags. Not the most interesting, or the best way, but hey- I had them already!
Tougher to do with my little snippers though- fine until I lost the rubber cover for the tips. Need to find an alternative to protect the other stuff from the snippers. Hmm.
Once I had many, many forms covered I jumped into creating flowers. It seemed to go faster for me after I came up with a routine for putting the hexies together. I went clockwise and started the second layer of the flowers in the y seam which seemed quicker.
For the sake of space, I put the first layer of petals on all of the centers. I added the second petal row to each flower later on.
When I had less time to work with, I stitched my 3 leaves together so they were ready to go.
The Set System
I started this project with the intention to make the center of the quilt larger, however I also wanted to finish this quilt.
Pinterest helped out with some alternative finishing options – and I was able to readjust a bit to decrease the size by losing the partial flowers on the edges. Now on to finding a system that would allow me to more easily put the thing together.
Full disclosure- I got super excited when I had some flowers done and threw them together.
Without a plan.
That was a mistake.
So I had to figure out how to incorporate that mistake. Without taking it apart…
Luckily for this project, sewing leaves onto opposite sides of the flowers, then putting two flowers together would allow me to do just that.
Then I would put them together with another set of two, creating a larger set of four.
The Quilt Plan
Plan it out – I know that goes against the traditionally scrappy nature of it. A plan will allow you to set goals if you want to finish, or just give you an idea about when ‘done’ is actually ‘done’. It may also help you to avoid my mistakes…
I am fortunate enough to have received the EQ software as a gift, so I was able to print out a blank one block template to help. Instead of using the computer for this design, I chose to go with old fashioned pens and pencils.
Here you can see my plan for how to work with my mistake – the darker outline is what I put together before I figured out what the sections would look like. I did manage to use it as it was by adding some leaves, but it wasn’t pretty. You might also be able to tell where I did away with the partial flowers between the paper and the quilt.
I mentioned the other day having been sick. Hand stitching required very little energy or brainpower and suited me just fine 😊 Not to mention I had been trying to have this done by June, so I am almost going to make the self imposed deadline.
Now comes the sad for me part – I did decide I needed to fill in some of the dramatic gaps left. They didn’t appear so bad on paper, but the effect on the quilt was too much for me. I will be creating a few more hexies in a different shade of green to finish the quilt. I am going to cheat and applique the quilt onto some borders so I don’t have to mess with binding the hexies.
I figure it’s my quilt and I will do what works for me – this will work for me so that’s what I am going to do.
I will do one last post with this project when I have it all done- I hope that will be by the end of July but we shall see. I am also planning some small EPP projects for fun – stay tuned!
Let’s go quilt!
Amanda
