Hello? Hello? Is this thing on?

Let's see if I can remember how to do this.

I've been busy. Really, really busy. There's no need for explanations or excuses. It's my own fault; I take on too much.

So,  I'm getting emails like crazy that the link to my easy-cut hexagon printout isn't working. I moved it to Google Docs last year, and the links seem to be working for me (even when I'm not logged on to Google), so I'm not sure what the problem is. If you have ever previously downloaded any of my PDF's from the downloads page above, please clear your browser cache, reload the page, and try again.

Here's the link to the ONE INCH EASY-CUT HEXAGONS. If you are looking for it and it still won't download, please let me know in the comments below. If you have emailed me requesting permission to use the easy-cut sheet in a class you are teaching, please go ahead and use it. If you haven't asked me if you can distribute and make copies, please don't unless you ask first.

While I'm here, I suppose a little update would be appropriate. This year, in addition to my freelance design job and teaching sewing classes (among other obligations),  I'm training to become a Texas Master Gardener and I am having an absolute blast!

Gardening isn't a new hobby for me, but this is first time I've received any formal training. The Master Gardener program in my county is the largest and most active in Texas. I've been studying botany, landscaping, fruit and nut production, turf and trees, irrigation and rainwater harvesting, composting, vegetable gardening, entomology, diagnosis and management of plant diseases, plant propagation, flowers and shrubs, and so on and so on. I've added words like xylem, evapotranspiration, and peduncle to my working vocabulary and I now know the difference between a dicot and a monocot. 

The Master Gardener program takes a year to complete. If all goes as planned, I'll graduate in January and become a state-certified Master Gardener. As we move into spring, things are really getting busy! I'm assisting in public school gardens, community gardens, hospital gardens, historic landmark gardens, and women's shelters gardens. I'm working in our amazing Botanic Garden, learning to assist the public with home horticulture when they call the County Extension Office, and this weekend, I'll be working in a conservatory full of butterflies from around the world. I'll be the volunteer at station #1 making sure no one opens the emergency exit, reminding people not to touch the butterflies, and answering questions about the butterflies and plants in the conservatory.

  

If you made it through all that gardening talk, I've done a bit of sewing lately too. I think I've made four rag quilts in the last couple of months. Everyone is having babies!

Next week is spring break and I. Can't. Wait. I'm hoping to make some serious progress in the basement, which we are in the process of converting into a sewing/art/craft studio. There's some sewing I'd like to get done and I just started converting my daughter's unfinished Creative Memories baby book into a Project Life album. And of course, working outside! I've got veggies to set out in the garden and perennials to plant.  I'm going to need a week off after spring break. 

The first stitches of 2011.

I hope that you and yours had a lovely holiday season and are enjoying the new year. I've been a dangerous combination of lazy and busy, accomplishing almost nothing creative in the past month or so. Would you believe I can't remember the last time I bought fabric? For shame!

My UFO pile has grown to monstorous portions, so it's time I get back in the swing of things.  I was invited to join a talented group of girls over at the Bee Hexed In bee on flickr.

Last night, I pulled fabrics for Brooke's block,

and made hexagons for the first time in a long while.

My right thumb is really out of shape!

Speaking of hexagons, I haven't given up on the hexagon charm quilt, but I have to be honest, I really got sick of working on it and it's been intentionally neglected. I need to get it out and take stock of where I am. I have more than enough hexagons made, I just need to sew them together. Maybe some longer stitches are in order.

Before I go, I want to apologize for not responding to comments and not reading your blogs lately. I've read every comment I've received and appreciate them all, I've just been swamped. You guys are the best!

Hexagon Thoughts :: Progress

I've fallen behind on my hexagon posts. I've been absorbed with a few other projects lately, along with work, preparing to move next month, and constantly driving back and forth to town. But, I thought it was time for an update, so here goes.

I've got 472 hexagons attached to another hexagon. I'm still sewing strips of 10 and 11 together into sections and planning to attach the sections once I have more completed. I'm hoping this method will distribute the fabrics from the same collections evenly throughout the quilt.

A few weeks ago, I noticed another duplicate I sewed in by accident but, I'm not going to tell you where it is, you'll have to find it later! So, I went through all my basted hexagons and pulled out a number of additional duplicates. I was surprised at how many more I found. Along with the duplicates, I pulled out a number of hexies I've decided not include, mostly because I decided that the fabrics were too light/pale or too sophisticated for me.

As of today, that makes my basted-but-not-attached hexagon count 726. The stacks above contain 25 hexies each.

I have no idea how many fabrics are in this 3.5" stack of squares. These are the fabrics I have yet to baste from swaps and new fabrics I've cut into. I still need to go through my folded stash and cut squares from those fabrics. I'm going to hold off on any more swaps until I get more of these fabrics basted.

Here's the box I'm using for hexagon storage with all the necessary supplies.

And this is an adorable little box I found in the school supply section at Target. It has a magnetic closure. This collection is so cute I couldn't resist some folders and notebooks too. 

The best part about this box is that it fits in my handbag (I usually carry a big-ish handbag) and holds everything I need to make hexies on the go. Fabric squares, papers, scissors, needle and thread.

My tip for the week: Use old bobbins of thread to baste your hexagons. The bobbins are much more portable than a spool of thread (which wouldn't fit in my new box) and in my case, I have lots of wound bobbins from old clothing projects that I'll likely never use again.

If your bobbin thread gets unruly, use some of those little stretchy, fuzzy ponytail holders to wrangle the thread. Don't overpay buying them at the sewing store, just buy them at the drugstore.

There are 175 members in the hexagon charm quilt flickr pool! I really need to spend some time over there admiring all the beautiful work everyone is sharing. If you are in need of fabrics for your quilt, there are a number of swaps going on also, so check out the discussions.

Thanks for the love on the cheater fabric. So far, I've only received the initial FQ I ordered before I entered the contest. Those poor guys must be overwhelmed with orders. I've ordered additional yardage to cut into FQs, so I'll let you know as soon as I receive the yardage. I'll get another post together, maybe for tomorrow, with my thoughts on how the fabric turned out.

So, how is your hexagon quilt coming along?

Perle Cotton and Hexagons

Thank you for all of the kind comments on my first mini quilt! I had such fun with that hand quilting. I foresee many more Perle cotton quilted quilts in my future.

Speaking of Perle cotton, I made a score on Ebay. This is 36 balls of size 8 DMC Perle Cotton...

that I got for $30 with shipping! Woo hoo! That's like 80-something cents each! They are mostly older, but are unused and I read online that they age well. They had been stored in plastic bins. Between these and the inexpensive perle cottons I ordered from Threadart, (thank you for the tip, Sarah!), I'll hopefully have all the colors in my Paintbox quilt covered. That's the plan at least.

We spent last evening at my mother's house for some fun and food with her and my brothers and their families. As I was sewing hexagons together, my adorable niece enjoyed going through them picking out her favorite fabrics.

I think she's got pretty good taste!

I've decided that storing the hexagons by color was causing me to over think my random layout. (Plus, they outgrew the storage box.) I dumped them all out and mixed them up. Now, I'm trying just to reach in and grab the next one and go with whatever I pull out. The only editing I'm doing is attempting to avoid attaching two of very similar color or print adjacent to one another. I'm probably still over thinking it, but at least I'm not spending a full minute or more on deciding which fabric to attach next. The best scenario for me is to ask an uninterested party to select the next hexagon and avoid the paralysis of analysis altogether.

I'm sorry I've fallen a bit behind on the weekly hexagon posts. I have a couple of piecing videos I'd like to record and hopefully I'll get those done this week. If you need a quick hexagon fix, check out everyone's progress in the flickr group. I love seeing all the beautiful quilts evolve! Keep the photos coming!

I 'll likely be scarce this week; I have a mountain of new freelance work I need to get done between swim team practices and entertaining my out-for-the-summer daughter.  Enjoy your week!  

Hexagon Thoughts :: Week Eight :: Cheater, cheater!!

I know I said I wasn't going to use the same fabric twice in my hexagon quilt, but when I saw this Lecien La fille de Pooh-tan today, I decided I'm going to be a cheater. This cute cheater patchwork is made up of 20 precious prints.

 

I trimmed it into 3" squares and then down to 2.5" squares for my one inch hexies. I guess when a fabric is really nice (and I think all Lecien fabric is really nice), maybe it's okay to cheat. Y'all just don't tell anyone I cheated, okay. I'm not planning on cheating any more after this, but if you want to, cheater prints like this would be a great way to add unique charms to your quilt.

 

Do you want to be a cheater too? This 15 x 12" swatch contains 20 different prints. Would you like to have it for your hexagon project? Leave a comment asking nicely and I'll draw a name on Monday evening (after dinner, Texas time). Good luck!

Hexagon Thoughts :: Week Six :: Piecing in sections

There are many ways to piece your hexagons. I've found that piecing in strips is working nicely for me. In the photo above, I tried piecing in a flower shape (the end with the monkey), but since I'm working with a planned random* layout, I really find I like strips better. I attached strips to my flower and now it looks like a jellyfish!

*In my planned random layout, I'm trying to make my quilt look random while avoiding having like colors or prints touching one another and maintaining a nice distribution of colors.

I've been sewing strips together and then attaching them to my largest piece once I've created a small section. I like this method for a couple of reasons. One, it's portable. I can sew strips together just about anywhere that type of thing isn't frowned upon. And two, I find that the more I handle my work, the more the back of the hexagons ravel. By piecing smaller sections and then attaching them to the larger piece, I'm handling the larger piece as little as possible to keep the back nice and neat.

Above, I sewed the top two rows together (I'm alternating strips of 10 and 11 hexagons) and then laid out the next three rows trying to get a nice color distribution.

Once I have them laid out, I stack them in the order I'm going to sew them together,

and tuck them into my box. Although I'm not making a color spectrum layout, I've been sorting my hexagons by color to make it easier to pick the color I want when I'm laying them out or sewing them together.

Another reason I like the idea of sewing them together in sections is that I can distribute similar fabrics throughout the quilt. This week, I started making hexagons with a few new charm packs and if I attach all of those now, they might end up clumped together in one section of the quilt (i.e., all of my Hunky Dory could be in one area). If I make small sections, I can attach the sections together later and spread them out. I still haven't attached the section with the duplicate. I'm going to wait until I'm further along and I'll attach that section far away from the section containing it's duplicate. 

I wanted to issue a little disclaimer. I've been looking around online at English paper piecing. There are many different ways to baste and piece hexagons, so please keep in mind that this is just the way I'm making mine. I think that using squares rather than fabric trimmed into hexagons (paper plus seam allowance) and basting through the paper are both non-traditional methods. My only concern with using squares is the additional bulk on the backside when hand quilting. If you are planning to hand quilt and are concerned with bulk, you might want to try trimming your fabrics before you baste. I tried trimming away some of the bulk on the back of already pieced hexagons and it was pretty easy. I'm not too concerned with removing the basting stitches. Since I haven't tied any knots, the stitches come right out. I'll have more on that later.

It's really fun to see all the pretty hexagons everyone is making! I've made more than half of the hexagons I need to make a throw sized quilt and I've pieced 272 together. Now that I'm this far along, thoughts of making a larger quilt are creeping into my head. I need to perish that thought!

If you have a question and leave a comment, I'm unable to answer your question via email unless your email address is public (or shown) in your profile. I'm trying to reply to all the comments I can, but I'm a little behind! I really do read every one and appreciate the time you take to leave a comment.

Hexagon Thoughts :: Week Five :: Hexagon Piecing 101 Video

For those visual learners (like me) out there, here's the Hexagon Piecing 101 video!

Please look past my dry hands and raspy, early morning voice. My allergies have been terrible this spring. 

Let me know if you find this kind of thing helpful. I love actually seeing something done in addition to reading instructions and looking at photos. If you do find it helpful and would like to see additional videos, please comment and let me know what you'd like to see.

I also wanted to add (again) that I use size 9 betweens hand quilting needles and 100% cotton hand quilting thread in light brown for piecing.

If you are making a hexagon project and would like to swap scraps with other fellow hexagon addicts, please visit the discussions at the flickr group. There are some great swap ideas being proposed and we'd love for you to join us!

I caved.

And life just got a little easier.

Hexagons Thoughts :: Week Four :: Quilting Hexagons

Have you thought about how you are going to quilt your hexagons? The first thought that comes to my mind is that I will probably want to hand quilt my hexagons because it almost seems a shame to machine quilt it after hand piecing. Below are a few hand quilting options I was thinking about.

One thought was to quilt around the inside edge of the flower clusters. You could also quilt inside the center hexagon of each flower if you needed additional stitching to secure your batting.

The most time consuming method, but my favorite, would be to quilt inside each hexagon. You could do multiple hexagons without tying off your thread by moving the thread from hexagon to another inside the quilt.

This one looks a little strange in the diagram, but I think it would be very interesting on a quilt. It feels a little modern to me.

This one looks peculiar in the diagram too, but I think it would actually work well. A major advantage of going with diagonal stitching is that you avoid the bulk in the corners of the hexagon by stitching only through the straight sides. 

Added on 4/27/10.  Kait had a great suggestion and I think this is close to what she described. Another great choice!

I know there are many more options for quilting patterns and I would love to hear your suggestions. What other interesting ways have you seen to quilt a hexagon quilt?  Do you have a vintage grandmother's flower garden quilt that has interesting quilting?

Blog neglect and hexagon progress

I've been neglecting the blog this week. It's been one of those crazy busy weeks that leaves you moaning desperately for some downtime. I haven't been home much this week and when I have, I've been working. My freelance work comes in spurts and when I get a big project(s), it usually takes a while to get it all wrapped up and out the door. That said, I've still got a lot of work to do and this upcoming weekend is packed with my daughter's 10th birthday festivities.

Fortunately, hexagons are perfectly portable and I've taken them along with me this week and worked on them when I have idle moments! I was able to get a lot done during the two hours I spent at the tire store having one tire patched and one replaced. Yes, it's been that kind of week. 

   

Here's a quick visual puzzle for you. My quilt wasn't going to have any duplicate fabrics. How quickly can you find the repeat above? I was devastated when I spotted it! I had planned on using ONE fabric twice in my quilt, but this isn't the one I would have chosen. I don't think I have the energy to attempt to cut out all those tiny stitches and remove it, so I guess it's staying. That means I can't let another duplicate into my quilt and it's getting harder and harder to spot them, especially when I'm using the same prints in multiple colorways.

After I discovered the dupe, I went through my loose hexagons and found four more that I have already used. That's when I repacked my box by color and counted my hexagons. I've made 594 hexagons for my charm quilt and have 200 of them attached to another hexagon! I've really enjoyed seeing your progress in the flickr group too!

Thank you for the kind comments about the video. I have not forgotten about the requests for more and I will get some done, I promise. The video was really fun to do. On that same note, if you've sent me a message or left a comment this week, I sincerely appreciate you taking the time to do so and I'm sorry I haven't had a chance to reply.

If I'm not back there before next week, have a lovely weekend. Enjoy some downtime for me!

Sunday Sewing

I made hexagons in the car on the way to church yesterday, on the way to lunch yesterday and on the way home yesterday.

After cutting more fabric and paper, I made hexagons on the sofa watching What would Brian Boitano Make? until I dozed off.

After dinner, I made hexagons while watching last week's Project Runway. (I thought Emilio's dress was awesome!) Then I cut more paper and fabric and made hexagons in bed last night.

Hexagon total for Sunday: 159
Whew!

Hexagon Fussy Cut Template

I was fussy cutting some fabric for hexagons and I had this very simple idea that I thought I'd share with my fellow hexagon addicts.

Using some template plastic (or other similar transparent plastic), trace a square the size you need for your hexagons. I'm making one inch hexies, so my squares are 2.5".

Place one of your paper hexagons onto the center of the square and trace around it's outside edge.

Use your paper (not fabric) scissors to cut out your plastic square and then color around the outside edges of your hexagon with a permanent marker. Be sure to let it dry before you handle it and if you use a Sharpie, hold your breath. So stinky!

Use your new template to find the perfect fussy cut for your hexagons.

(Yep, I actually own that fabric.)

When you find the perfect placement, trace around the outside of your template...

and cut it out with scissors or your rotary cutting ruler and rotary cutter. Please don't use template plastic as an edge for a rotary cutter. 

And, there you go. Perfect fussy cut hexagons!

It's helpful for finding the perfect spot on busy prints,

or aligning that polka dot directly in the center of your hexagon.

Yea! Happy fussy cut hexies!

ETA -  I got that template plastic at JoAnn. It's less than $2 a sheet and is in the quilting notions area. I've also seen it at Hobby Lobby. I like the heavier weight more than the super thin stuff.