Sunday 31 January 2016

Change of the Glorious Hexi plan : )

 
So .... that was the plan according to the Facebook group pattern for the Katja Murak Quilt with Me/Glorious Hexagons - the framed hexis as above.
But the more I made, the more each finished hexi was slightly different in size and joining them meant in places, as much as a quarter inch difference in sides lol infuriating!
Making up your own templates you have to be precise and I clearly wasn't precise with my wadding and backing!
So I considered crocheting the blessed things together but didn't want to give in to that idea.
So, change of plan,
I took the backing fabric frames off them all and am now joining them together instead, but I am sort of toning the fabrics I'm using instead of using loud and just any colours!
I will lap quilt size them and then border them round with  'frame'.
Thus, this is the new plan ..




Lori Holt devised the 'BLOOM' pattern for stitchers which she has kindly provided free and ideally you need to buy her special templates to facilitate making the quilt properly.
http://www.sewandquilt.co.uk/shop/bloom-sew-simple-templates-lori-holt-of-bee-in-my-bonnet/
 
Lori has made it with her own fabrics too and they are delightfully bright and cheerful.
http://beeinmybonnetco.blogspot.co.uk/

Picture below taken from her blog, so pretty isn't it!


Lori's blog is a joy to follow so do nip across and take a look and her wonderful tutorials in blog posts  are extremely well put together showing how to use her templates successfully.

She uses fusible web as a backing to her shapes, turning them inside out which makes appliqueing them down so much easier ( for me!) than applique needle turning.

Well first let me confess I haven't bought her templates, shame on me I know.
So no surprise if my versions turn out skew whiff and that will be entirely down to me and in no way Lori's patterns fault.
In fact its likely to prove how very much more sensible it would be to buy the really great templates!
I meant to buy them, but off the cuff, I sat and faffed with some fabrics just to see how the shapes might look whilst trying out the fusible backing method.
I really like that method and ended up with 2 blocks made .... now I may as well follow on for a few of the blocks since I am not likely to make it full sized anyway.

So as is my way: I half read the instructions : ) and ended up with this


which you might notice is missing the small squares at each corner duhhh
So then I tried inserting corners and ended up with edges and points that didnt match and that was going to be annoying so - I changed the plan - again!

This is as far I've got so far and I have yet to decide how I will adjoin the blocks but I suspect I will go the simple route and repeat the above block style again.
At the end I may embroider or add in a folksy stitched square at each corner and save myself the headache of trying to match corners!
I know, but why stress yourself unnecessarily : )
 So here's as far as I am now, just a small circle to stitch in the centre of the 2nd.




There are 4 delightful short irises blooming away in my back garden!
I guess they are January flowering anyway but really, you'd have thought they'd' have hung on till it was warmer!
But they are a joy to see and the unusually mild weather is turning now so I doubt they will be around for long.
The wonderful part of this time of year is that the days are gradually pulling out and it is lighter earlier mornings and for that bit longer in the afternoons.
Bring on the longer days!

 



5 comments:

  1. I've been a Lori Holt for ages and have been sooooo tempted to do her see along--so cute! If I were to start it, I'd follow your lead and do without the templates. Your blocks look very nice!

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  2. Hear hear for longer days! Now if we could only figure out how to not only get longer days, but more hours packed into them. That looks like such a fun quilt!

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  3. I lke your new plan for the hexagons Lyn and your 'Bloom' blocks look lovely! Christine x

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  4. Your new hexi plan is looking good and I love your blocks. We have daffodils out all along the lanes but I haven't seen a snowdrop anywhere. It's certainly a funny year!

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  5. So frustrating when things don't go as planned. Taking them apart and stitching them together into a quilt top is an excellent idea! If you get tired of making the blocks you can just fussy cut some large hexagons from big prints and they would fill in any empty spaces!

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