I just finished the top for my first OBW - lovely hexigons from farm/cow fabric - and I think that it turned out great. Now I must quilt the beast....and am trying to figure out how. I've carefully flattened and ironed the intersections, but holy cow.....that's alot of fabric all in a big lump! My machine was having issues just stitching it all together, I don't imagine that I'll be able to free motion (or have long armed) without breaking a good number of needles....and there is NO WAY that I want to hand quilt through all of that!

Oh...next dilema....my sides stretched when I put on my boarders and I need to square up.

How have you overcome the OBW hurdles? What pattern did you use to quilt?

Linda - San Diego Quilter

Can you pick a quilting pattern that avoids the hexs centers? :D:D:D

Take a rubber mallet and wackem one it will help flatten them out, I have a kaleidoscope at the quilter now, I have not heard if shes had an issue but I know my good friend Deb used the same quilter for her moms kaliedoscope and the quilter did not mention any breakage of needles or any other issue .
hope this makes you feel more comfortable
Sandra

did you press seams open? That helps me when I have a lot of seams coming together in one place. I've also been known to use a small dollar store mallet with a felt coating on it to smash the centers a bit.

Many LAQs just like to use meandering.
Your color/design and hexagon shapes will be dominant, IMHO. :-)

I stamp all of the above, great advice !!!

With the seams pressed open I didn't find that there was that much bulk in my OBW's. I quilted some of them in the ditch, since that gave a lovely design on the back and quilting doesn't show much on the front anyway. Others I just did swirls, feathers, whatever...

Oh yeah, show us your OBW!!! We want to see it.

If your quilt is not squared after putting borders on then you should take them off and remeasure to make sure the sides are equal and the ends are equal. Sounds likt was not measured.

Finally - here are a couple pics of the quilt. Sorry - could not get the entire quilt in one picture. I hung it on my wall unit and I could not back up any further without going up the fireplace.....

Per the suggestion, I think that I will take the boarders off.

While I cut sides and top to the measurement of the center of the quilt, both the quilt top and the boarders stretched as I sewed. Will it help if I trim them and starch the heck out of them? I didn't use a walking foot, but think that I will when I put them back on.

BTW - I just LOVE this group!!! :)

Linda - San Diego Quilter

That came out just beautiful! Love the fabric you used - who would have thought cows could make such a pretty OBW?