Sewing Saturday

Last night I closed the door to my craft room at 7pm and didn’t come out again till 10pm and what did I get done............well not a whole heck of a lot. I thought that I was going to get all three of the blocks that I had cut out finished and in the end I ended up with one block getting the best of me...LOL

I worked on a Starflower block for Tara in Group 2 of the We Bee Learning Bee. I have wanted to make this block for quite awhile and was excited to finally have the chance to give it a try. It gave me a lot of practice working on half square triangles.

You get 24 hst with this block enough to make 2 blocks. It involved a lot of cutting, but for the most part I think my blocks were pretty good.


I was very excited to lay it all out and have it actually look like it was suppose to!!


However that is where the excitement stopped...LOL I sewed my rows together easy peasy however when I had to sew the rows to the other rows I couldn’t for the life of me get the buggers to match up!  I have never had this much trouble and I think it had something to do with having the press the seams open. I never press my seams open and when I have to match seams up for the most part they are either right on or oh so close. However this time I was ripping and resewing at least 8 times on one set of rows. It didn’t help that my machine wasn’t cooperating either. For some reason my feed dogs were not advancing and it would just keep on sewing in the same spot....this made it even harder to rip later...LOL

Oh well the second set of rows went together a bit better and I only had to reverse sew twice. When it came to joining them all together I just pressed my seams closed and everything lined up a lot better. So after 3 hours of cursing and yelling I did end up with a finished starflower block that I am happy enough with to send off to its new home.


Today I may try and tackle the other block in addition to finishing up my 2 just for me as well as my wonky house block that needs to get done and mailed off ASAP. In regards to the wonky house does anyone have tips for machine appliqué? I have been practising for a few days and my machine always bunches the fabric up when I use the blanket stitch. I am going to look online again for some solutions otherwise I think I may just have to mail it back as is since I don’t want to wreck her block.

I hope everyone is having a great day

Comments

  1. Great job! I am impressed.....all those triangles!

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  2. Your block looks great! I have to say I NEVER have any luck when I press seams open! I like to have that 'locked' joint or 'abutted seam' to kind of go by! Who knows! Best of luck with the machine applique! I am not good at it so not much help here! LOL

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  3. Your block came out wonderfully! When I press open, I really do have to pin. I do liek pressing open though as the block does tend to lay flatter.

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  4. I have a suggestion with getting better matching between the rows.

    Numbering the HST's row 1: 1,2,3,4 row 2: 5,6,7,8

    I would sew 1 to 2 and 3 to 4. Then 5 to 6 and 7 to 8. Next, sew 1-2 to 5-6 and 3-4 to 7-8. Now you've got 2 new squares. Do the same with the bottom half. Now there's 4 squares. Now, sewing top left to top right and bottom left to bottom right and then the top to the bottom, there should be much less trouble with matching. You can double check by measuring the interim blocks too. The 4 blocks should be 6.5". Good luck with yours.

    With the blanket stitching, try making your stitch length just a bit longer. If the fabric is advancing a tiny bit more, then the bunching should stop. See if that helps.

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  5. Oh the colors in this is fabulous. I adore your block. Happy sewing...

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  6. Gorgeous block! (I share your frustration with "pressed open" seams.)

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