DogHouseMom

I am so mad at myself. I had 4 panels that I wanted to make a fractured quilt out of. I spent all day yesterday blocking those stupid things cause they were wonky (with help from the board - see my previous post "help me get the wonk out of this fabric"). Finished that up this morning and they were OK to use. I then trimmed each panel down cause I only wanted the center portion, not the borders. I had to make sure of two things A) all four panels had to be trimmed to exactly the same size with the print in exactly the same position and B) the width and length measurements had to be in a multiple of my 1.5" strips.

Lining those suckers up and cutting the center panel to just the right size and the same position in all 4 took me pretty much all day today. At first the width of the panels were 17 3/4" ... so I had to bring it down to 17.5" right?

Wrong.

I was *thinking* (without thinking it all the way through) that I only needed to bring it down to the NEAREST 1/2"!! Nooooo ... 17.5" is NOT evenly divisible by 1.5".

Except I didn't figure out my mistake until I had most of my strips cut and was looking at the remaining 4" and thinking "how the heck are you going to get 3 strips out of that?".

DRAT! DRAT! DRAT!!

And no ... I can't just cut to the last 1.5" strip because then the panel won't be centered and that will bother me ... forever.

I need to get another panel and wash it, starch it, stretch it, block it, cut it to the right size - cut the other three panels to the right size, then start my strips again.

OH BOTHER!!

(In real life I said something other than "drat" and "bother"!!!)

grammy17

Can you get one more small piece to fit with what you have cut? Not start over?

Scissor Queen

Washing caused most of your original problem. I wouldn't repeat that step.

DogHouseMom

No, washing didn't cause most, or any of my original problem. After looking at all 4 of the panels I'm convinced that the print is wonky, not the fabric. No matter what I did on all four panels the lower right corner 'goes south', while the other 3 corners were straight. There is no way that washing would have caused the exact same error on all 4 panels. As it turns our I had to cut that part off, and it didn't matter because I wasn't too concerned with that part of the design - I only wanted the center. I'll still have to block the new one though with at least one of the others as a "guide" to make sure that everything stays in the same place.

In the future, if I am going to do a project (like OBW) where I have to match the motif on layers of fabric, I might forgo washing and just dry press it. But I would never combine washed cotton with unwashed cotton in the same quilt as the unwashed cotton will shrink while the washed cotton won't. It's all or none.

Painiacs

I'm so sorry hope it all works out in the end!

katier825

It can be very frustrating working with panels. I've had some so bad that I had to cut with scissors, not a rotary cutter. I cut then blocked them. I was just cutting into squares though, I wasn't trying to line up the design. I wonder if you'd be better NOT washing the fabric first.

Raggiemom

I hope it all works out for you. I've noticed a few panels that I worked on weren't quite straight.

Cherylsea

I was told that the problem is in the printing process - the pattern doesn't go on properly and therefore they will always be wonky. Not that it is any consolation but I have the same problem - I convince myself that my math is right .... but, sometimes it isn't. Hope you can salvage it so that you like the results.

JenelTX

If you put the one wider strip in the center, then the panel will still be centered and everything will look balanced. (If I'm picturing things right.) Sorry for your frustration! I hate all this math in quilting! LOL

majormom

Oh, I feel your pain! Sometimes our 'ideas' get us into so much trouble. Ask me how I know :-)