Thursday, 25 August 2011

Farmers wife - Familiarity breeds contempt

Apart from slowing down the number of Farmers Wife blocks I make each week, I've noticed that the last few I made have not been quite right.  Usually this means a date with the seam unpicker and a little cursing, but lately I've let them slide......a little bit short on 6.5" square? - I'll fix it up in the sashing....seams not matching? - no one will notice amongst 111 blocks.....points a little blunted? - what's a blunt point or 2 amongst friends?

The latest block (no 37, Flower Pot) started with a great deal of promise.  Remembering the issues I had with the very similar Bouquet (no. 8 - I'm doing mine in numerical order) I carefully cut out the templates for the flower bit and rotary cut the rest.  I even remembered to cut the Pot on the diagonal so the effect wouldn't be lost on point.  All good so far - even when I realised there was a Y seam I just went with the flow.  I sewed and pressed and sewed and pressed and for the life of me, I can't work out how the block finished at 6.5" x 6.25".  I thought to myself, I can fix that up in the sashing (there's a couple of others that have finished the same size) and went outside, in the glorious sunshine, to take a photo. 

I uploaded it onto the computer and went to edit it for the close-up view - and that's when I noticed the Pot part will have a severe ding when it's joined to it's neighbours.  As I said above, what's a blunt point or 2 between friends - but I'm making a bit of a stand I think - I'm going to remake the block and it WILL finish 6.5" x 6.5" and the points WILL be perfect - then I'll feel so much better about continuing with the Wife.

To keep the relationship strong, you just have to keep working at it - compromising when required and making a stand when it's important.  Hm, in my head I can hear a robust version of 'Land of Hope and Glory' - I'd best just jump off my soapbox now.....


Block 37, Flower Pot - the dodgy one


3 comments:

  1. Love that block..something you may not of considered...it happened to me...when I first printed my templates off the first couple of blocks...they finished at 6.25 which I thought was weird...I wasn't going to worry about it, but the nerd inside of me told it wasn't right..so I fiddled around a bit and found that one the printer settings had resized the templates, so you may have to check that.

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  2. Just been looking around your blog. I love your FWQ and that you're doing it in all red and white. It's going to be beautiful.
    Your hand-dyeing looks great and makes me want to try.
    And you've done a lot of great work.

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  3. I went on Amazon to look up this book and one of the complaints in the comments portion was that the templates for this book gave everyone fits! So I think your struggles are probably due to some of what others were finding--that something's just not right.

    That said, I love the block and love the red prints. I just finished up my table runner with your block in it and was thinking of you, so had to check in. Besides that, I'm a little slow this week with my WIPcomments!

    Elizabeth E.

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