'Wot RoTT' exchange

[Annis C.]

Kathy, Yes, I will admit I did have problems! Evidently I was cutting my 1" strips a scant more than one 1". And, my 1/4' seam that I was sewing was a scant less then 1/4 inch! Fortunately, I had only done one 22' unit. They were too big! Cutting the outer strips wider only helps if your 4 1/2' unit is too small! Since we are pressing the seams open, taking in each seam was not an option, and there was no way I was going to rip all of it out. So, I ditched the first long unit, trimmed all of the rest of my strips, and made my seam a little bigger.

And, I will include 2 fat quarters! Thanks Rosemary and Lorna!

Dawn
In beautiful Northwest Montana

Even though we are pressing the seams open, taking in the seams is a perfectly good option IMO, do one seam at a time, remember to remove the old line of stitching, re-press and re-measure to see if you have lost enough, or need to take in another seam. At least if you are taking them in you don't have the stitch marks showing. :wink: I have to admit that I am getting quite a dab hand at it with this project :roll:

[Annis C.]

Just to clarify: When I said that the idea is to have completed 3.5 x 4.5 strips, I mean that is what I will be sending out.

[Annis C.]

As long as that is what is on the guidelines on page 1 you should be ok.
But I think that I should admit that some of mine are coming up a thread or two under the 3 1/2" measure ops:

[Pamela O.]

Kathy, even though I trimmed the excess width off of my first set of strip sets I still had trouble when sewing them together and they ended up a little wider than they should have been. By pressing the seams open you gain a little width because there is no fold in the seam allowance so your scant seam doesn't need to be as scant. Since I didn't cut my last strips wider like Margo did I had to be careful that I didn't end up with too small a block. I ended up having to use a slightly wider seam allowance for my last seam in the center so my 2 middle strips are right on, the strips next to them are a little wide and the last strips are a little short. These are the olive ones and you really can't tell the difference. I think different widths in the strips makes the blocks more interesting. For the pink ones I used a different piecing method, not enough space to explain here, so all of my strips are really close in width. That took more time though and in the end it really doesn't matter.

Thanks, Annis. I had never thought about pressing the seam open making a difference. That explains why my practice strata came up I little too wide. Normally, I do not have a problem with my seams. Thanks for the explanation. I love TQS.

[Pamela O.]

Help, help help!! What am I doing wrong! I sewed my washed starched 1 “ stripes together and look what happened. Although they measure okay, I can only send in four out of six blocks & looked how skewed the second strip is in the first block and one of the other blocks! What can I do to straighten this out to look at pretty as all of yours? Cut the stripes before sewing them length wise????? :cry: :cry: :cry:

[Dawn S.]

Not to confuse anyone Rosemary, but taking in my seams on my first unit would have been over 150" of seams to rip out! :shock: That is why I said it was not an option! I am not a masochist! I like fun happy things! It was much easier to just start afresh. (Remember, I was not working in small 3 1/2' units like you did, but the larger units, like Margo's, except I was using fat quarters.)

Dawn
In beautiful Northwest Montana

[Dawn S.]

Here is another block from the same first batch...

[Rita C.]

I had to do several practice runs to get the width right. Yes pressing the seams open does make everything just that little bit bigger and Kathy that's why your 1/4" guide is probably not accurate for this project. I had the same problem. I had to move my needle to the left by one notch. I also made my outside strips 1 1/4" to give me wiggle room. Barbara, if you put a ruler under the foot of your machine, make sure it is lined up with the line marks on the bed of your machine and then put some masking tape along the line of the ruler (and even double it), the ridge the masking tape makes should help you sew straighter seams. I think that is your problem. I sewed my strips in approx 22" strip widths as some of my fabric was fat quarters and I found this easier. I pressed the seams open with a dry hot iron because this seemed to cause less distortion. When I had the strip finished I lined it up on my pressing mat which has a grid on it and steam pressed it to fit the grid. I then left it to get cold before moving it to the cutting mat. This seemed to straighten it out so that I was able to cut my spools as accurately as possible. Once you get into the swing of it these are actually fun to make. Hope this is of help. Rita.

[Rita C.]

Help, help help!! What am I doing wrong! I sewed my washed starched 1 “ stripes together and look what happened. Although they measure okay, I can only send in four out of six blocks & looked how skewed the second strip is in the first block and one of the other blocks! What can I do to straighten this out to look at pretty as all of yours? Cut the stripes before sewing them length wise????? :cry: :cry: :cry:

Don't Panic!
By turning the block 90 degrees, it is easier to see that the problem seams are the ones inside the white square I have drawn. I would suggest that you start with the left hand seam of the two and re-stitch starting about 2 threads nearer the cut edge and finish near the centre of the white flower. Remove the previous line of stitching, press, then put it under your cutting ruler and see if that has straightened things out enough, if not move on to the next seam (again, take the taper lower than the box is drawn).

By placing your clear 6"x12" (or whatever size it is) ruler over the block, it is quite easy to analyse which strips are the culprits and where abouts along the seam it starts to go squint.

I have been working my way through all of my blocks double checking them and after a bit my eyeballs become calibrated enough to look at a set and know whether they will need restitching without using the ruler, I do however use the ruler to make sure that I adjust the correct seam, and to work out how much by, but mostly it is either 1 or 2 threads max.

Hope this helps

[Lorna B.]

I've just tracked down my american cohort, who has temporarily fled UK (I didn't think the weather had been that bad!), and am discussing about ways & means for sorting out the return postage payments. I will keep folks updated once we have sorted things out a bit more.

Yes I did leave the country for the last week, but not because of the UK weather. Seems to me the winter has been a lot more mild than I was expecting... I am not complaining about that though. I was able to make it home to San Diego for my dad's 80th birthday. I went a few days early to help my mom and brothers finish up on the preps for the party. There were lots family and friends and it was a wonderful tribute to his 80 years. Also he and my mom just celebrated their 60th wedding anniversary in September. So it was all and all a joyous occasion. I flew out from San Diego late last night and arrived home (UK) this evening. Back to work tomorrow!

I was so excited when Rosemary started talking about a new exchange. I volunteered to help with the sort and I thought I might make shipping to and from the states easier with my APO box since we can use US postage instead of international. (I use US first class postage on all my mail to and from the states) Then once I receive all of your packages I will head up to Rosemary's for the sorting party. Sounds like if there is time we may even be able to make it to the quilt museum in York ...but we'll see how that goes. That may be another trip.

So now that the holidays and parties are over I need to do my part with this and get my reels sewn together.

Lorna

[Margo C.]

Like Rita, I gently pressed the seams OPEN with a hot dry iron, then used a generous amount of steam to make sure the sewn strata was straight and flat and I let it cool in place. Then it was an easy job to trim the entire strata to 4/5" wide and cross cut to 3.5". It did help to have the extra width on the outside strips and trim them down to the right size after the strata was complete.

If anyone needs help with seam allowances, you might want to check out my tutorials here: http://daily-blog/103-good-advice/14...-seam-accuracy
or here: http://good-times.webshots.com/album/569415726bHNKHF

[Margo C.]

Thanks Rosemary & thank you Margo;

I have already cut all my fat quarters 1” strips so I don’t have any fabric left. For anyone else out there fat quarters (according to my calculations-old correct anyone if they are wrong) I found if you cut 1” stripes WOF when you sew the eight fabrics together you can cut six blocks from them. So do some test blocks before you cut all you fat quarters into 1” (big mistake) ; see Margo’s post! Anyway ;I will try again tomorrow and see if I am unable to figure out the seam issue (I did a scant 1/4” seam already :roll: ) I may have to get new fabrics and change my color. I am open to any colors that haven’t been claimed yet & someone wants in their quilt :lol: :lol:

[Catherine S.]

I was happy to see I wasn't the only one who had trouble with the seams and finished blocks. My blocks may be a thread or two narrower than the 3.5 inches. Still plenty of room for a seam allowance. Hope they are ok. ops: My problem was I used different length strips and tried sewing them together that way. I did alot of ripping! The next set will be from fat quarters and I think it will work better. If I decide the first set is not good enough, I will make a third set. :roll:

[Kathryn S.]

It seems like many of us are struggling with trying to sew these strips together! I hadn't thought that pressing seams open would make such a difference in the finished width, but it does make sense. If I started over (argh) I would definitely cut the strips wider and trim down.
Or at least the outside ones! Right now I am faced with yet another pair of strips that comes up way more than 2.5 inches. I will take it apart and re-sew with a wider seam allowance. I've been home sick for several days with bronchitis so perhaps that is a factor in my dismay at seam ripping! At least I'm not the only one. I said it earlier today, that I will appreciate every block I get, and won't get out the ruler to measure either . Thanks all for the support and cheering up.
Kathy

[Kathryn S.]

Postscript: And, you can be sure also that if I ever do any strip piecing like this again, I will have learned what to do!
Kathy