I am putting a storm at sea border around a panel to create a wallhanging. Unfortunately I cut the panel to the theoretical size, and now that I have completed my units and sewn them together, I find my panel is a quarter inch too small. Okay, lesson learned. If I ever do this again I will wait to cut my panel until I have created the border first, but in the meantime my panel is too small. How should I handle this? Can I just try to stretch the material over a distance of 21 inches, or will that make it look ruffled? Should I try to make my seams larger on the border portion and risk lopping of my points? Thanks in advance for any advice!

Is it possible to cut the panel down a bit more, and add a plain border before the pieced one?

Wow! My little boo-boo doesn't see so bad now. I'll be watching to see how this is handled. Ya' learn something on here ever day!

Can you take in the seams slightly on your border pieces? maybe a threads width here and there will make up the difference without losing your points?

Another thought is to use Sharon Schambers starch method of enlarging/reducing blocks... it should work for the border pieces too :wink:

I would add a flange and leave a good half inch seam allowance on it. A flange is just a strip folded in half and inserted into the seam. It'll be loose over the panel instead of stitched down.

I would do this. Just make the plain border thin and it should look fine.

I made my seams a shade wider in the storm at sea border, and made the seam allowance of my panel a shade smaller, and it looks to be working out, although I haven't sewn the two rows together yet. Thanks for the advice!

can you add more storm at sea blks so you will get a measurement you can add to your border to make them both fit? an inner border works wonders in this type of problem.