I'm trying to finish my oldest UFO, a trip around the world with a 14 " border last
 

I'm trying to finish my oldest UFO, a trip around the world with a 14 " border last and it's got blocks on the ends. I've got the side borders on nice and tight after much agony and all day yesterday. Now I want to add the remaining borders, the ones with the blocks and I want the blocks to match perfectly, of course. So I'm wondering if I should pin match the blocks and then divide the center into quarters etc. There will be some slack, I can tell from laying it out already...

Any other ideas for ways to do it properly...or so it looks great? This is an xmas gift from over 4 yrs ago...as a gift, I gave him a single block and let him pick out the pattern. Just after this, I read about making quilts as a gift and not allowing the recipient to pick the pattern, a theory I wish I's seen before trying this quilt. I truly think I'd have finished sooner if it's been a pattern I wanted to work on:D

I can't help with your question, but I wanted to congratulate you on finishing up your oldest UFO.

I hadn't heard about not letting a quilt recipient pick the pattern, but I can see why this might be good advice. Thanks for the tip. :thumbup:

I like to let my quilt recipients pick the pattern and fabric. Then I am assured they will like it.

Sorry I can't help with the question. I have only made one Trip around the World, and I love the result, but it was wayyy toooo much trouble. :)

No kidding! I used big blocks and tube quilting, but I hated it, hated it hated it...I'm still not sure he'll get it this year:), I may even break down and see if the woman who taught my basic quilting class has time to quilt it....

If you have slack in the border you will have problems when you start to quilt it (or when you turn it over to a longarmer, she will have problems). Can you remove the slack and make the borders the right length before you add them? That would avoid problems down the road.

I'm pretty well stuck with it where it is, it's not a great deal of slack, but there is some, some of it is on the quilt, not on the border and I have no more fabric to recut the border. I'm pretty sure it can be quilted in and eased in, but I was hoping for a magic trick from all you super quilters!

Well if the border is somewhat shorter than the quilt, that may work in your favor. Quilting the center heavier than the border will draw the quilt center in and it will lay flatter. Best wishes on a good outcome. Show us a pic :)

To take up slack. I 've increased the seam size from 1/4" to about 5/16" in several places. Surprizing how fast it takes up slack!

Well, I wound up having to taper one of the seams in the pink border on one of the blocks. Two of the blocks are off by about 1/4 " but I'm not fooling around with them, I don't want to wreck the fabric, I can see it turning into one of those situations where it gets done over and over:)

Tomorrow it gets a good all over pressing and then I've got to layer it. I may try splitting the batting into thirds since I'll try FMQ on my dsm. Wish me luck!