Sunday, March 28, 2010

Flower Garden Quilts

Have I mentioned how much I love making flower garden quilts.  I have made so many I have lost count.  Tonight I couldn't sleep, so instead of tossing and turning, I decided to get back up, and work on this flower garden top.  The flowers are made out of vintage 50's and 60's fabrics.  There are some funky combination's of fabric, which I love.

Unlike some people who cut their irregular scraps into squares and the like, I tend to cut mine into hexagons.  I love working with them, and if I was to only be able to pick one shape, and one shape only, I would definitely want hexagons.  So many patterns and quilts can be made from the lowly hexagon, and they are certainly not boring to piece together, they provide a bit of a challenge, but once you are used to sewing the hexie together, they are just as fast as any other shape. 

I certainly love to piece them by hand, I can fly through them in no time at all, and I believe I was able to piece all the flower for this quilt with in a fortnight, and tonight I started joining the flowers into rows with four white hexagons between each flower, then every odd numbered row, gets surrounded by white hexies, while the even numbered rows only get the four white hexies between the flowers.  Then the rows are sewn together, with half flowers inserted once the top is complete.  Once that is done, I generally do one row of hexies of white around, then its ready to be quilted.

Don't be afraid of the hexagon, give it a try, and make your own hexagon quilt.  And I don't use English paper piecing, I just cut my hexagons including seam allowance, and piece in a traditional manner.

2 comments:

  1. I love your hexies and admire all you hand piecers and GFG 'addicts'. A while back I had received a starter pack, but my hand sewing skills(?) are pathetic. I end up poking my fingers until it stops being funny. So now I just look at beautiful hexies/ flowers from other people and enjoy them much more.

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  2. Very pretty blocks. I have never made one of these before.

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