I have just finished this months Down the Rabbit Hole sewing. It’s a block-of-the-month quilt by Sarah Fielke, I’m loving it, though it is pushing me out of my comfort zone. I tend to procrastinate when this happens and I ended up a couple of months behind. Luckily this month Sarah gave us a light month so I’ve managed to catch up.
This is where I was last time I showed you, forty houses made but only twenty stitched on. This month we made the corners, bringing a bit of sunshine to the quilt. I toyed with fabric choice for ages, the starting point with my fabrics was a Moda range called The Potting Shed, there are some soft gold/tawny ones in the range but I only have a 10″ and a 5″ square of each one. I know in the next border I will be stitching the other 3/4’s of the sun, so I wanted to make sure I had enough. In the end I worked out I had enough for four sets of points in one 10″ square, as there are 4 different prints I’ll use a different one for each set of points. The circle is a pretty, soft purple pattern which reminds me of watery sunlight at dawn.
The suns are hand appliqued, Sarah is gradually introducing new techniques, so this month was how to applique inside points. They all went together pretty easily. I think I’m getting the hang of hand applique now!
It was then fairly straightforward to stitch the suns to the houses and then both borders to the quilt. I checked measurements across the middle and everything seemed hunkydory so I stitched on the purple border, made neat mitred corners and then measured again…
It was perfect in the middle, but the outer border was an inch out and the edges were a bit wavy!!! Sarah is stressing to us the importance of getting the border measurements correct as with a medallion quilt each time we add a new border any mistake would be multiplied. I did briefly consider fudging it with a couple of discreet tucks, but I knew I would regret it so out came the seam ripper!
I took the purple border off and half the houses and double checked the green border. I changed my tape-measure as I discovered one of mine is no where near accurate, I used a 2m metal measure instead which I usually have resting on my sewing table. It was a bit unwieldy on the floor but at least I knew it was correct!
After checking and re-checking my measurements I worked out the main problem was my initial mitres on the green border, they look neat but they actually flare out a bit, not a lot but enough to make a difference when I then added another border!
I didn’t take all the houses off, I decided to unpick each mitred corner and hand-stitch it back down again, so it’s not as perfectly neat, but at least it is square!
By this time I was pretty paranoid about checking measurements all the way along the borders! I stitched the purple border back on but left the corners until I was happy the rest was correct, I checked them afterwards with my quilting square…and breathed a huge sigh of relief!!
So I’m all caught up with three days to spare before the next installment comes out!
I’m linking up with Kathy’s Quilts for Slow Stitching Sunday, why not have a look what everyone else is hand-stitching.
thecraftycreek 
So pretty
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oh wow!!! this is looking stunning! I love your choice of fabrics. Colours are all so soft, and it makes the design so relaxing.
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What a lot of work, but as you say, if you don’t fix it as soon as it happens, the problem multiplies. It’s looking very gorgeous and beautifully neat.
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OMGoodness! I admire your work
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You had quite a struggle, and I appreciate that you explained what happened, and why it is important to get it right before you add more! I will keep your explanation for my medallion quilt that I am working on – thank you! The sun fabric – points and center – are perfect choices for early morning light, and the colors of the houses seem to go well with early morning light as well! Bravo!! I enjoy reading your posts about this quilt.
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I love this design so much and you are so right that you have to make sure each stage is correct before moving on to the next one. I’m having the same sort of thing with my crochet along blanket – I’ve undone some rows several times as the stitches or measurements were out and I’m only in the early stages so if things go wrong now it will ruin the whole thing. Your comments about your tape measure made me think as I’m using one at the moment where the metal end has dropped off and I’m sure it’s stretched. I don’t use tape measures for quilting but I do use them for crochet and knitting so I’m going to check them all now and chuck all the ones that don’t measure up (sorry for the pun).
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Thanks Tials, accuracy is so important with some crafts, some things you can fudge, but not with a medallion quilt! I usually use a quilting rule, but my biggest one is 24″, I did consider lying all my rulers in a row but decided to use my long rule instead 🙂
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Yikes! How very frustrating to discover an inaccurate measuring tool! Great explanation of the fix, many will revisit that in the weeks ahead.
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Beautiful! I’m working on this quilt also but still have a few houses to build!
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Thanks Sandra, the houses did seem to take forever to build!
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what a beautiful project! I love the colours!
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Thank you, I’m really enjoying stitching this quilt
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Oh my! Love the sun’s in the corners. What a fun quilt to build. So sorry about the issues but sounds like you found and fixed it with time to spare.
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That is exactly what I detest about quiltmaking… adding borders that don’t lay flat and trying to figure out how to fix it! Good for you for sticking with it! My blood pressure went up just reading about your journey! It looks fantastic, so well done!
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This quilt is getting better and better. I know all about having the wrong measurements. It is very annoying, but best to get the measurements corrected than pitching the whole project in the end.
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The colors in this quilt are so soothing. I love how it is coming together. Glad you figured out why it was”t measuring up correctly. I look forward to seeing the rest of your progress.
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