basting a project on the kitchen floor

truth be told, I've been working on waiting until there was a finished product to show [off], but then I realized that since I do all my quilting by hand, that could take a while. So what we'll go with here is a finished top and the back to go with it, and maybe, if I can get the Lyd off the laptop pictures of it being basted.

exhibit A

I have a bin of 2" wide strip scrap that I used to make this [exhibit A].  The little green box is full of 2" squares.

This project started with a 2" square in the middle. Two more 2" squares on either side of the middle. Sandwich strips. Sandwiching that. Wash, rinse. Repeat. And if I'd been having a good week day, I wouldn't have said ah, screw it. But that's another story.

 





Basting on the floor.Now improved with pictures.

• A clean floor surfaced in linoleum or similar, big enough to service the project
• some painters or masking tape
• safty pins or thread and a needle

making the sammich... mmm, sammiches...

tape the bottom down to the floor with the painters tape so the bottom doesn't cha-cha out of your way while you are smoothing out the batting ... and I did piece together this batting from two bits of something else. Things are a little lean right now, not going to lie.
 






















so, bottom layer then batting... then put down the top and smooth it out over the batting, which sticks pretty well to the bottom and the top; this may take some jiggering.

When you are satisfied that it's as good as it's going to get, BASTE! [I basted with safety pins] Quilt in the method you so desire. Have it ambushed by the cat.
  

In theory...

In theory, it's three 2" squares with 1/4" seam allowancecs. Which should get a strip of three blocks that are 5" long. This is all still mathematical theory. So then one cuts two strips that 5" long that match the outermost squares and sews them on to make a sandwich of the block strip, figuring that if the rectangle is rotated 90 degrees left or right, its still going to be 5". Because 1 1/2" + 1 3/4" + 1 3/4" should STILL EQUAL 5". [Somehow this didn't quite work out.]  So then one rotates the square 90 degrees, takes a 5" strip of a different color and sews that on, flips the block and does it to the opposite side. In mathematical theory, one should now be able to sew on a strip that's 7" long to the opposite sides of the block that need to be finished to finish the block.

Maybe I should get my eyes rechecked, or re-eyeball what a 1/4" seam allowance is. Long story short, if this had been a cake, it blew up in the oven. So it's a little cattywhampus. If I figure out what went wrong, I still have a bag of 2" scrap strips. I can always make another one. Upstairs wants one.