27/04/2013: Almost May already! This year is going so fast!
02/04/2013: Happy Easter. I hope everyone had a fantastic weekend.
01/01/2013: Happy New Year!!
24/12/2012: Merry Christmas!!
13/11/2012: Getting hand-made presents ready for Christmas!!

Friday, March 23, 2012

Different Hexagons


I'm glad I've been having so much practice with basting and sewing tiny hexagons because it is making this project a lot easier. These are two blocks from a new quilt I've just started which I hope to get done fairly quickly for my husbands boss who is due to have a baby any time now.

The pattern is from the book Material Obsession by Kathy Doughty and Sarah Fielke and is called Three Ring Circus. The one thing I didn't like about this book is that it says it is an easy to cut pattern with a 60 degree ruler, but the method wastes a LOT of material and didn't seem very accurate at all to me. I had sewing issues and had to rejig my first hexagon to make it lie flat and on top of that the rest of the instructions are quite lacking as well.

For the second hexagon I gave up on their method and cut three 8.5x5" rectangles which I then cut in half diagonally to create my 6 triangles of each colour and these went together easily and lay nicely flat when ironed out. The great thing about the central featured hexagon is that it hides any little alignment errors you might have had with that bulky centre!! If you're wondering, the featured fabric is of Australian animals.

So while the designs in the Material Obsessions books might be nice, the instructions are lacking and cutting methods are wasteful, so have a think before you start and you can probably come up with a better way to achieve the overal look of the design in an easy manner. They're not the cheapest books either, so I'm glad I got them on sale - I bought Material Obsession and Material Obsession Two and this is the first quilt I've made from the books.

I'll show you how this one turns out when its done, or maybe give you another progress photo soon!

2 comments:

Cathy said...

They remind me of the paper umbrellas in those fruity drinks!
I find it a bit frustrating when patterns waste fabric. It is getting so expensive now, I save almost every tiny bit! I am glad you figured out an easier and more efficient way to construct them, and then shared!
Good luck! I am sure it will be darling when you are finished.

Metanoia said...

I save all the little bits as well!! One day I'm going to try out some arty quilt techniques with all the little bits I've been saving.