Tuesday 16 April 2013

Wonderful Weekend and Violet Problem Solved

We had a lovely time with Cardygirl. Chatting to the wee hours, retail therapy and of course lots of sewing. We ate far too much, but who can resist Cardy's delicious cooking. Cardy and her husband were wonderful hosts and it was nice to catch up with their children who we have known since they were very young.
A trip to a local patchwork store inspired Cardy to try EEP with a quarter inch hexagon papers. We thought Cardy insane highly motivated to make hexagon flowers with paper pieces smaller than a finger nail. After all,  what you would do with these fairy sized flowers? (Except make quilts for beds in doll's houses). If you have any suggestions, please forward them on to to Cardy.


Here's a comparison of Cardy's hexagons and mine.


Cardy then worked on her octagon quilt.


Lots of progress made...looking very nice.


Julie made great progress with medallion on her Legacy from Violet quilt. 


Rectangles... 


...and pie pieces.


With a little help from my friends, I was able to solve the problem I was having with my EPP Violet quilt (see the labels on right hand side bar if you haven't seen this project). Those of you who have followed this blog will know that a great degree of forcing  easing was required to fit the top and bottom borders to the centre medallion. The result...the quilt looked like the surface of the ocean with a 10m swell. No amount of quilting was ever going to smooth over those lumps and bumps. So with a bit of reverse sewing, removal of the two centre stars and replacement of border fabric with a large piece of fabric helped. Finally I appliquéd  one of the stars into a central position to solve the problem. 

You're probably wondering what I am going to do about the gap. 


Two options:
1. Appliqué two smaller stars either side of the centre star.
2. Use the space to embroider initials and the date the quilt was completed (just like many antique quilts, probably in chain stitch)

But for now, I am happy that the quilt lies flat and will decide how to fill the gap later. I have only fixed the bottom border so far, will fix the top border soon. 

The good news...I've figured out how to avoid the problem for the following borders. Reluctantly I will put it back into the cupboard, until I finish a couple of more pressing projects.  


 I need to finish my cross stitch birth sampler.It has to be with the framer by the end of the month if I want to give it to my niece in time for her Christening. Will show you the progress on that soon.


5 comments:

  1. It felt so sad when you drove away! It was fun, and I bought some large hexies last night like yours...fun!

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  3. Looks like a lovely weekend. Those hexies are y too small. Glad you solved your Violet problem. Some extra quilting in the space could help too.

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  4. how did Cardy manage to stay up into the wee hours with you 2 night owls.........maybe you could include Cardy's baby hexy flowers in your gaps......plenty of space for those tiny things........

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  5. Looks like you had a wonderful weekend!!! Your quilts are gorgeous ....I'd leave the gap and do extra quilting too....

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