Well, I goofed big time. I bought my fabric before I read the directions (I know I'm a dufus.) I bought 3 yards of fabulous material not realizing that most material has a 24" repeat. Don't laugh but I thought "I only want to make a small lap quilt or wall hanging just to learn with" and now I have only 4 repeats to work with. Sob... I also bought 3 yards of the same designer thinking I would be able to use 2 beautiful pieces of fabric in my OBW.

I had to leave the quilt room...I am such a dufus. Does any of you wonderful OBW quilters have any ideas how I can salvage this project? I've thought maybe I can use 2 triangles of the other fabric to make the half hexagon, but even writing that down doesn't sound like it would work. Can anyone tell me if they have had this problem and how they solved it, or should I just call it a day and crawl under the covers? (Sob, sniff....)

Ask cutebuns if she can help you... PM her, she is really good at helping us out. :D:D:D
I am thinking that if you have 4 repeats, and you split the fabric in half lengthwise, you will have enough for a smaller quilt.
If you can do this with both pieces, you will have an even bigger quilt :D:D:D

You could do a four patch poisie that only needs four repeats. I don't know the name of the other quilt but its kinda sorta like four patch only they are longer strips sewn side by side. that needs a four repeat too.

With 4 repeats you can make the one of 4 squares. Trying to use the repeat across the fabric doesn't always work as the design is not always in aligmnet.

This has already been suggested but what I thought of as well. Just do the 4 patch. Same concept as the hexagon (6 repeats, 6 patches) but you only need 4 repeats, 4 patches. After cutting your strips, each strip, I assume, would be cut into squares. I've seen the pattern but don't recall what it is called. If I can locate anything specific, I will post it.

Take a careful look at your fabric. Can you find the same pattern repeat somewhere other than the edge? (In other words, does it repeat itself going across the fabric?) It's possible that you can cut the fabric lengthwise first, and you will have more repeats. I think this is explained in the first OBW book.

I didn't explain this very well, so let me know if I need to send a picture to explain.

All is not lost!!! See whether you can get the extra two repeats from the other half of the fabric, as amma suggested. If not, perhaps you can buy a bit more of the same fabric to get the extra two repeats?

Assuming you can get your six repeats in some way, using hexagons from two different fabrics could make for an awesome OBW quilt.

And if were to find yourself left with just four repeats after all, there are tons of other options. Make four-patch posies perhaps; or you could also consider making kaleidoscope blocks into a different kind of OBW (4+4 repeats in the octagons, and 4 small triangles in the small squares). If you combine the pieces cleverly, it would make for a wonderful look.

You could also fussy cut 6 identical areas if the Stack 'n' Whack method won't work. That's how they make the Dresden Kaleidoscopes. No reason why you couldn't cut 6 equilateral triangles instead of Dresden blades.

You all are the greatest! My mind has been spinning and I kind of thought that there may be a way to squeeze the extra 2 repeats from the other half of the fabric. I had to put it away for this evening but I can't wait until I'm fresh and ready to go in the morning! Its funny but I didn't buy the first book of "One Block Wonders" because most of the readers reviews said the second book is the best. I guess I should have bought both books.

I'll check to see if any of your suggestions will work tomorrow. Again thank you so much for taking time to give me such good advice!

Susan

Once you locate what the actual repeat is it is easy to find the others. Especially if you are doing a smaller piece of work. There is usually three on the width of the fabric.

If you go to the main page and find the section for OBW and go through it you will find all sorts of pictures etc of what others have done. There are all sorts of ideas for using different fabrics even. I will warn that they are addictive.