lainealex

I am attempting to sew a series of complex eight-point stars from a book by Jinny Beyer. Each block has about 60 pieces. I am working very meticulously with accurate templates, marking the corners, pinning, watching my 1/4 inch seam and everything else I can think of to prevent problems. Everything seems to work/lie flat and go together perfectly until the last unit, at which point I sew on the final unit and the whole block poofs up into the shape of a salad bowl.

I have been taking the blocks to a sewing class and the teachers think I am doing everything correctly but we can't figure out what is going wrong.

Does anyone have experience with these salad bowls forming on 8 pt star blocks?

What can I do to prevent this happening AND what can I do at this point to fix it? Can I block the stars at this point to press out the bulge?

Thanks for any input,

Lainey