Day 4, Seven Seams

Just seven more seams to join the rows together and the center of the queen size Japanese Jigsaw quilt will be assembled and I can take it off the design wall. It’s about time. This photo is the bottom half of the quilt which will attach to the top half from yesterdays photo.

I have a love/hate/love relationship with all of the projects I make. I love the beginning, the planning the excitement of a new project. The project looses its appeal when I have past the point of creativity and I no longer need my imagination to see what it will look like finished. The part when the instructions read “make 4 million identical units” is the moment when I start to loose interest. I’m also easily distracted (usually toward a new project) so I have to create ways to stay focused.

To get through the construction of all 88 units for this project I have been using a stack of small tumblers to keep me interested. We have an Accuquilt die cutting machine here at the store. In addition to being my favorite new toy, I “need” to make samples of the dies that we have so that customers can see what is available. I cut stacks of the small tumbler using my big bin of 1930’s reproduction fabrics. As I am sewing the JJ units together, I feed a pair of tumblers through at the same time. I clip the JJ unit off, press and add the next JJ unit. Before removing it from my machine I feed through another random set of tumblers. This process always keeps something under my needle. The entire quilt is chain pieced and as an added bonus, I was making a table runner size sample of the tumblers at the same time.

Unfortunately – or fortunately, I never calculated how MANY tumblers I would need for the table runner. I just cut, sewed and when a strip looked long enough I stopped adding to it. The plan was to work out the details when I thought I had enough. Judging from the strips I have partially assembled and the stack of tumblers I have yet to use, this table runner is going to be a baby quilt! One thing I know for sure, I either need to add many more red pieces or that one in the middle had got to GO!

Later today I will be starting a new project. The JJ quilt needs a rest while I contemplate the borders. Once those dreaded 7 final seams are together and I toss it on the queen size bed at our house to calculate borders, I will fall in love with it again.

Karen

Sewing,sewing,sewing.....

It's been a busy day with lots of interuptions. In my time-laps world it is acutally 9pm. I've managed to turn the corner on the on the JJ quilt and with another row or two I will be half way finished. From that point on, working on the diagonal, each of the rows gets shorter and faster!

Stitching the blocks together once they have been trimmed is very easy. Nothing has to match! The only thing you have to keep in mind is that the blocks have to be off-set slightly to created "dog ears" on each end. Your stitching should start right in the "V" that is created by the dog ear on one end and end in the "V" created on the opposite end.

That same process takes place when you join the rows together. You have to shift the rows so that the intersections in the center of each design unit match. It isn't difficult, but it is one of the only areas I use pins.

Tomorrow I will keep sewing, one row at a time!

Ready Set Sew

Once again, I’m not following Tracey’s color plan. This blue and grey version is going to be a gift for friends that own a house in the islands. Their guest room needs a new bedspread and they are in the fabric industry, so I think it should be a quilt!

I suggest that you make a copy of the layout diagram that is included in the pattern. Before you all gasp and fall over dead that I suggested that you make a copy, this kind of copy is ok. It is for your own personal use. I’m not telling you to make a copy to sell or give away or in some way deprive the designer of her rightful fee. I’m telling you to make a copy of the layout diagram that you can mark-up, color, scribble on, without destroying your original pattern. That is perfectly OK.

Now you have to arrange your squares the way you would like to see them in the quilt. For this queen size project that layout would be massive. It would require my substantial design wall and then some. Instead, I arrange just one of the squares from each design element. Each square on the wall represents 4 pieces. They are arranged every-other-one because a grey background square goes in between each design element, but I see no reason to put them on the wall, I know where they go.

As you can see from the top corner, the rows will be assembled diagonally, so that is the way I choose to make the blocks. Instead of making all of the blocks before I start sewing them together row-by-row and cut them into shape as I go. When I have finished an entire row of blocks, I sew them together and add it to the body of the quilt.

This requires that all of those “layout” squares have to stay on my design wall until I finish putting this top together. I can’t layout anything new until I’ve finished piecing the JJ top! I need to get this one off the wall so that I can get this one ON the wall!

Here’s the step-by-step:

Make the 4 patch blocks using 2 squares of background fabric and 2 squares of print (from adjacent design units). This is where the copy of the layout comes in handy!

Press the 4 patch. Place the ruler over the block and align the lines printed on the ruler with your seam lines. Trim all 4 sides.

This block has the color on the “pointy” ends. The next block in the diagonal row will have the background on the pointy ends.

The pieces at the beginning and end of the row don’t have to be full blocks. They will be cut in half, so I only use 3 squares when I assemble them.

The center of this quilt will be 8 units by 11 units, that’s 88 blue blocks and 70+ background blocks… I better get sewing!