Some projects become UFO's because you have made a mistake that you don't want to correct. At least in my experience. I have been working on a scrap quilt, made from my own stash of scraps (which I thoughtfully keep pre-cut in to specific sizes) and also remember my friends have been giving me free scraps because they don't want to be bothered to cut strips and squares from their left overs. This scrap quilt was supposed to be fun and easy. No planning on colors, just make nine patches out of my 3 inch blocks and alternate with snowballs. Easy, peasy and pleasing to me.
But! The snowballs. Cripes! We all know you just add squares and fold and cut those into triangles and then (of course) take those little triangles and made them into half square triangles. We don't want anything to go to waste. They are easy blocks. Unless you use the wrong sized square. I promise I did two practice blocks and they were fine with my taking my 3 1/2 inch squares and neatly trimming those to 3 1/8 inch squares (I mean, who precuts anything to 3 1/8"?). Yesterday when I went to put all the finished blocks together the points on the snowballs did not line up properly with the seams on the nine patchs. Eeeaghghhhaa!
Trust me. I am not a perfectionist, at all! This will be a donation quilt, but still, EVERYONE would notice that the points don't match....by a lot! I was tempted to take the blocks off the wall and donate them, to two individual groups/people. Snowball balls to one group and nine patches too another group. Who would know that there were originally enough blocks for a whole quilt but that the quilter was not a math whiz? Nor smart enough to use references available on the 'net? Instead, I decided to find a solution. Now. Not make it a UFO for later. My solution? Mark snowball blocks with a deeper seam, match those marks appropriately on the nine patches, pin and sew. My thinking was that people would be less likely to notice that the outside nine patches were slightly more of a rectangle than a square than they would notice the points didn't match. So I marched forward with the mantra of "mark, match, sew, examine, trim" and although it is not completely pieced I think my solution worked. I certainly do have points that don't match but it is much better. What do you think?
As always, making a mistake helped me learn new things. First, an 1/8 of inch difference on the ruler looks pretty small, but when you are used to sewing 1/4" seams and then go to 3/8" seams, the difference looks huge! Secondly, these wider seams are easier to press open. I don't usually press open but I thought I would try this and hopefully find that pressing open would make for a flatter quilt. As it turns out, I didn't like the larger "shadowing" that showed through on my Kona white so after the first two rows, the shortest in an on point setting, I decided to sew at 3/8', trim to 1/4" and press to the sides. Still out of errors come opportunities for new experiences.
I hope you are having success with your projects! Visit Judys page for other Design Wall Monday inspiration.
http://www.patchworktimes.com/
Enjoy!
Toni
