The Joys of Uneven Block Borders

As you may remember from Thursday’s post…..

https://francesquilts.com/2024/06/06/one-top-finished

….I decided to use leftover blocks to finish the border but there weren’t enough to go all the way around.

This reminded me that UNEVEN block borders are so much faster and easier to make so I wanted to discuss it a bit here.

You see, if I was trying to fill the outside border with a certain size of block, I would have to do LOTS of math to be sure that they fit correctly.

I do enough math for work so I don’t want to do it unnecessarily in my studio!! Here is what I did instead…..

I first sewed background triangles to each side of the big triangles, making my “flying geese” blocks…..

They were not all even so I evened them up!!

First I measured 1/4-inch from the “goose” point and trimmed it straight. Then I measured out from that cut line and trimmed each of the blocks to the same width……

Most of the blocks trimmed okay, but one or two were not quite accurate in the corners…..

Normally this would be a major problem but, since I didn’t care if all of the blocks were the same length, I simply trimmed it off…..

Now I can lay out the border, leaving gaps in the center…..

I filled in the blank areas to finish the top…..

I think that the borders look great, they made use of “leftover” blocks and, very importantly, the top was easily finished!!

Have you used Uneven borders before? How did they work?

Go BIG or Go Home!!

This past week I showed you the piecing for my “Taxing Scrap” Quilt, including the finalized top.

As I got ready to quilt it, I planned out several complicated designs…..

Untitled design – 1

….and then realized that NONE of it was going to show. The piecing and number of fabrics was simply too complicated to show the lines of stitching.

So, WHY was I going to make it so complicated?

In the end I decided to GO BIG OR GO HOME…..

If you are reading on email, you can use this link to go directly to the video…..https://youtu.be/VVsqZt03758

In the end, I am very happy with how the quilting looks…..

…and most importantly, it didn’t take long to do!!

Do you have a “go-to” pattern that you use when you are needing something done FAST?

For Free-Motion Quilting ideas, be sure to check out my YouTube channel…… https://www.youtube.com/c/francesquilts/videos

One top finished

If you have been reading, you know that I have been making 6-inch scrap blocks using MOSTLY 1.5-inch scraps.

When I had cleared out much of my 1.5-inch scrap drawer, I decided that it was time to figure out a layout.

I had pieced approximately 45 blue blocks (that seems to be most used color), 9 pink blocks, 6 purple blocks, 8 green blocks and 4 BRIGHT yellow blocks.

I decided on a 7×9 layout and started throwing blocks up on the wall.

First I tried diagonal stripes…..

NOT my favorite.

Then I tried random…..

Definitely not.

Next I tried a more symmetrical layout with 3 of the yellow blocks in the center….

It wasn’t perfect but it would do!!

BUT, I had 11 blue block leftover and I was NOT going to let that happen.

What would happen if I cut those blocks in half and used them in a border….

There weren’t enough to go all the way around, but what if I placed them toward each of the corners!!

I liked how it looked and, more importantly, there was only 1 blue block left!!

You may also notice that I am auditioning border colors at this point.

One block left….what to do??

I did need a corner block, so what if I cut the remaining block into quarters and used them in the corner. But which direction…..

Facing out or facing in…..

You might also notice that I decided on and added a 2-inch yellow border!!

Next was to decide on something to fill in the blank spaces on the border. And remember that I had one yellow block left over.

So, it seemed that the only solution was to un-piece that yellow block and piece one more strip set so that I could fill in both the top and bottom….

Hooray….the top is finished!!

If you come back tomorrow, you will see the first stage of quilting!!

Now, is this my favorite quilt ever??

Not so much, but I love that I was able to use so many of my scraps and I see it as a great first finish in my “Summer of the Scrap”.

SEE YOU TOMORROW!!

Scrapping Principle #2

As I wrote about on the weekend, I am enjoying finishing the piecing on my quilt that has been dubbed the “Taxing Scrap”.

But, I had something happen that worried me, and I bet you have had the same worry.

As I was merrily piecing my couplets, I came across a stack of fabrics that were EXACTLY the same……

What was I going to do??

I didn’t want them to all be together.

I didn’t want them to stick out in the design.

This problem is one of the reasons that I suggest you find smaller sections of each big block and piece ALL of them first…..before you EVER finish a complete block!!

I am really bad about this because I get impatient….

…..and want to see what the final block is going to look like.

That often gets me into trouble!!

But since I was sewing ALL of the couplets before I started sewing the 4-patches, it worked out perfectly in this case.

I took each of those squares and matched it up with a different fabric…..

When you look at them like this, you DEFINITELY see the identical fabrics….

When you look at them like this, they are not as prominent….

….and when you see them in the finished blocks….

I dare you to find all of them!!

Scrapping Principle #3

Yesterday I talked about breaking down scrap blocks into smaller components, starting with 2-patches…..or “couplets” as I called them.

The next step was to turn those 2-patches into 4-patches.

When I first started, I had all of the 2-patches in a pile by my sewing machine. I would pick up one and then try to figure out which one I wanted to attach it to.

And then when I made a decision, often the seam allowances wouldn’t be nesting…..

….which meant that I either had to fix the seam allowances or change to a different combination of 2-patches.

YIKES…..this was taking forever!!!

So I decided to try something else.

Instead, I stacked up two sets of couplets, one with the seam allowance facing one direction and the other facing the other way…..something like this…..

Seam Allowance Placement

So now it was super easy for me to make a 4-patch.

Just pick up one couplet from one pile and one from the other and sew them together.

The seams magically nested…..

….making piecing and pressing a breeze.

And, unless the same two fabrics ended up together, I never even thought about which ones to put together. If they were next in the pile, they were sewn together.

This brings me to Scrapping Principle #3. And yes I know that I haven’t talked about #2 yet but I will on Tuesday…..

So now I have 4-patches to work with…..

I took 9 of these pieced portions and turn them into a 6-inch block, starting by sewing three 4-patches together….

….and then sewing the three strips together to make the blocks…..

I was trying to make at least 8 blocks from the green squares so needed to add some other patches to make them big enough. I pulled out my 2.5-inch scraps and laid out a set of green ones….