October Star Border

[Kathryn S.]

Yahoo, I just finished the October star border and posted it in Show & Tell. It took me most of the day, but I am pleased with the results. My colors are bright and kind of busy! :lol:
Mary in Sunny MN (for now)

Mary, I just love the colors you've chosen -- I think yours is my favorite of all the amazing colorways I've seen.
Brita

[Kathryn S.]

OMG! I can't believe it....I finished July, Aug and Sept. I am onto October. I am actually going to be caught up by the end of the week. Yahoo.

[Kathryn S.]

Gosh, I'm in the same position of wondering about the fabrics I chose for the setting triangles. I auditioned them before sewing the border, but now that the blocks are sewn together, it doesn't look like I wanted it to. Since the rest of the quilt is so heavily patterned with all those little blocks, the borders seem to want to have some patterning in them too. Arggh! I'm going to look at the Show and Tell to see what others have done with their borders. Kathy :?

Hi Kathy,

Although you may not be 100% pleased with the way your quilt looks now, remember that adding the flying geese and sawtooth star borders will significantly change your quilt's appearance. I'd bet that it will be fine. You are probably your own worst critic.

I was not pleased at all with the pink setting triangle fabric around my feathered star after I sewed it on, because it read as a solid. However, now that I've put on my border stars and floating borders, I think it looks much better. If you are like me, you will not want to take all of that apart at this point.

Good luck in whatever you decide to do. I'm anxious to see your quilt.

Nancy

[Kathryn S.]

Thanks for the vote of confidence, Nancy. I have 3 of the star borders sewn on and it's looking better now. When I sewed the bottom border , the bottom border was 1/8 inch wider than the edge I sewed it to. I made a decision to match the corners of the star blocks. The rest of the border fit fine, just the 4 inches from the star point to the end of the border was too long. Now what to do with that sightly wider edge? Maybe "sliver trimming" ala Eleanor Burns will work.

Kathy


Hi Kathy,

Although you may not be 100% pleased with the way your quilt looks now, remember that adding the flying geese and sawtooth star borders will significantly change your quilt's appearance. I'd bet that it will be fine.

[Kathryn S.]

Kathy,

Your quilt looks great so far. I'm looking forward to seeing your October entry.

[Patricia S.]

I have just finished putting on my first filler strip and was adding the star stripe, but it's too long...should I ease it in? Help Margo!

[Patricia S.]

I have posted in show and tell my progress so far. I only put one of the outer floater borders on as my star borders ended up being 9 1/4" wide. I also want to wait to see how I do the flying geese to decide on a color!

Maggie in E. Central Illinois

[Margo C.]

I have just finished putting on my first filler strip and was adding the star stripe, but it's too long...should I ease it in? Help Margo!

How much too long is it, Pat? If it's just an inch or so, you can probably ease it in. Any more than that, and you might want to make your floater strips long enough to accomodate it. The floater strips on the outer edge will help stabilize the fullness if it's not too much.

[Patricia S.]

Margo..it only seems to be on the one side that is longer than the other. I laced it with spray starch to see if I could shrink it some. It's one inch too long on one side, and two inches longer on the other..I must have stretched during pressing.

[Kathryn S.]

I have also run into a snag. My star borders were square when they were sewn on.

I measured across the center of the quilt to verify what length the outer spacer borders should be. It was only 1/4 inch off what we were supposed to get. The first two borders went on okay, although the border was just slightly longer than the edge. For the last border, the center was 63-3/8 inch. When I put the border strip across the center it's exactly right. However, when I put the border strip along the edge, i't's almost 1/2 inch too long! It's like the previous two borders were somehow too small. Arrghh!

So I'm not going to do anything more until I figure this out.

Kathy

[Margo C.]

Kathy, try to get your star strips to be the same measurement as the center of the quilt. You can usually do that pretty easily by GENTLY BLOCKING (steaming) them to the size you need...whether it needs to be a little longer or a little shorter. Gently steam it to the size you need and let it cool completely before you pick it up to use it.

However, it does sound like your inner floaters may be off a little.

[Lynn K.]

How did you press the seams when you added the corner pieces to the border stars? Where I matched my seams, it wants to go ONE way with the border star and the OTHER way with the other border star?

Lynn

[Geneva C.]

I pressed each seam towards the filler triangle, spinning the seam at the intersection where the seam flips to the other side. (Does that even make sense?) ops:

[Lorna B.]

Wow! Wow! Wow! I just finished looking at all the October BOMs on show and tell. They all look so fantastic. Congrats to everyone who is so caught up and posted their pics. I love the variety. Got to get busy myself as I am only done through April. Thanks to all for the continuing inspiration.

Lorna

[Lynn K.]

Whew! Done. Caught up! Woo Hoo! Posted in BOM.