May to Juliana - Quilt project - 2

 Here's one more attempt to make something as cute as Patty's envelope with a Thinking of You stamp. I tried this stamp on Paula's name and the four-leafed clover was terrible. These would have been fine if I had put the diagonal one with the leaves on the bottom. Also the cupcake needs to be larger. I can't figure out why that zigzag tiger design is so hard to duplicate. I'm not giving up yet - but... not impressed with how things are going.

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When I put a tiny flower in the center of a hexagon, I cut out a flower and applied fabric glue around the edge. I tried Fray-Check - but it saturated the whole flower and was rather stiff. Hopefully the tiny blanket stitch around each flower plus the fabric glue will keep it from fraying. At least with my unorthodox methods - nothing is permanent. Someone could always un-do what I have done and redo it to more standard restoration.

 

Not all of the original hexagons were *fussy cut* flowers - so when I couldn't find anything that worked for a large fussy cut flower, I substituted a calico. The one above and the one below are calicos - which are much easier than fussy cutting.

On the one below, I found some fabric that worked to fussy cut - and I discovered that many of these prints look like they have the same flower repeated - but there are 4 or 5 flowers within the print that seem to be the same - but there are subtle differences. So then -- I'd find 6 of the same flower to fit in the hexagons that are joining what I called - flat to flat. The ones that are not replaced yet - are joined to the solid color hexes on two sides. So, I would find a different flower to fit those 6 spots.

And - when I am done - I will never stitch another hexagon. Two sides are on the grain but 4 sides are on the bias - and those 4 bias sides are not fun at all. Plus - none of the hexagons are symmetrical - they have all stretched a bit. I'll spare you the whining....

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I added this a few days after this post ran - to show how much waste there is when you fussy cut. I was beyond lucky to find 6 of each flower for each of the quilts - a total of 24. That's exactly the amount of fabric that I needed - but so much waste.