Throwing away a project
08-31-2018, 06:09 PM
#31
Super Member
Join Date: Jun 2010
Location: Illinios
Posts: 1,260
I haven't thrown any thing away but have put it in a draw and tried to forgot about it, I tried to make the quilt Grandmother's Garden Quilt by Quilt in a day, I got a few block done and just couldn't make myself continue..I'm not agood at appliqué
Book and fabric will be going to the Salvation Army or some where ..Maybe someone would like to finish it as I can't...
Book and fabric will be going to the Salvation Army or some where ..Maybe someone would like to finish it as I can't...
08-31-2018, 08:07 PM
#32
Super Member
Join Date: Oct 2011
Location: Missouri
Posts: 4,061
I'm the person that rescues all those pieces, ufos and other failures from thrift stores, garage sales and de-stashing. Some I put together with other pieces and some I pass onto a friend to finish. Mine go to donation, hers sell on Etsy (and you'd never know they were made from discards). I have lots of orphan blocks and pieces that are waiting for inspiration.
08-31-2018, 11:49 PM
#33
Super Member
Join Date: Jun 2009
Location: Tavistock, Ontario, Canada
Posts: 1,056
Hmmm... now I'm wondering about that OBW I started a few years ago. Took a course at the LQS, bought all the fabric there as well so have $120 into it. Instructor insisted we make the 8 piece motifs so we'd have finished pices to see how they'd turn out. Well... three problems. 1. I got ONE layer off by just a hair and it shows. 2. To join the motifs, you need to cut a multitude of squares to put in the "holes" to connect the designs. Which means inset seams.... 3. The fabric I chose was blue and purple pansies on black. And It's VERY dark. The pretty blues and purples are not dominating at all. It is the luck of the layering and cutting... but I really don't like it.
So it sits, rolled up in a flannel sheet...
The only good thing.... another participant chose the exact same fabric. And then bought the rest of the bolt. So I couldn't add it as a border. But we'd exchanged emails because I was collecting scraps for dog beds. A Couple months later, she left me TWO garbage bags from her sewing room. And in that was … her mis-cuts. One of her layers was obviously too short, so one of the triangles was about 1/2" off. I've bordered them in black because I figure it couldn't hurt my pieces.
Maybe I should dig it out and put on my big girl panties....
So it sits, rolled up in a flannel sheet...
The only good thing.... another participant chose the exact same fabric. And then bought the rest of the bolt. So I couldn't add it as a border. But we'd exchanged emails because I was collecting scraps for dog beds. A Couple months later, she left me TWO garbage bags from her sewing room. And in that was … her mis-cuts. One of her layers was obviously too short, so one of the triangles was about 1/2" off. I've bordered them in black because I figure it couldn't hurt my pieces.
Maybe I should dig it out and put on my big girl panties....
09-01-2018, 01:16 AM
#36
Super Member
Join Date: Feb 2018
Location: North Carolina
Posts: 2,414
Originally Posted by rryder
I haven't thrown anything away. I always figure I can cut it up and do some improvisational piecing if I'm really not liking something I've been working on.
For problems with seam allowances that just won't lay flat, I've been known to use heavy starch (stay flow mixed 50/50 with water) and smash them with the iron. If they're still not flat enough for my liking after they're dry, I take the top, flip it over onto a board covered with another cloth to protect the top and use a hammer on the backside to hammer the intersections where the seam is bulky. This is an old tailor's trick for working with bulky fabric like denim, but it works very well with quilt tops made of regular quilting fabric. I do this a lot when I've got a situation where lots of seams come together.
Rob
For problems with seam allowances that just won't lay flat, I've been known to use heavy starch (stay flow mixed 50/50 with water) and smash them with the iron. If they're still not flat enough for my liking after they're dry, I take the top, flip it over onto a board covered with another cloth to protect the top and use a hammer on the backside to hammer the intersections where the seam is bulky. This is an old tailor's trick for working with bulky fabric like denim, but it works very well with quilt tops made of regular quilting fabric. I do this a lot when I've got a situation where lots of seams come together.
Rob
09-01-2018, 01:20 AM
#37
Senior Member
Join Date: Dec 2016
Location: Upstate SC
Posts: 680
Years ago when I first started quilting and knew nothing, was at a girls night out at the LQS trying to learn something, I asked if anyone had made a Cathedral Window quilt. One older very experienced quilter said she had and wasn't happy with it and threw it in the fireplace! I was aghast! All I could think of was how could you just burn up the fabric, the labor, how could you? Forward a couple of years and I thought I was confident enough to try my hand at a Cathedral Window quilt by hand! It was a mess, all wonky, every block joined just made it worse. I couldn't throw in the fireplace (didn't have one), but did just chunk it into the trash. It was a humbling experience and a very strong lesson. If it ain't working out, don't just struggle endlessly, just get rid of it and move on! There is always more fabric and more projects to be had.
As others have said, life is short, don't waste your treasure on things that don't give you joy.
Murphy
I am working on another CW quilt and it is looking very good. I call it my forever project and it may be done enough to drape over my casket someday. lol
As others have said, life is short, don't waste your treasure on things that don't give you joy.
Murphy
I am working on another CW quilt and it is looking very good. I call it my forever project and it may be done enough to drape over my casket someday. lol
Last edited by patricej; 09-01-2018 at 04:17 AM.
09-01-2018, 03:04 AM
#38
Super Member
Join Date: Aug 2010
Posts: 2,182
I store orphan blocks and unfinished questionable items in a large pizza box. I periodically (once a year?) get it out and actually do throw away old projects that I'm not crazy about. Sometimes it takes a few years before I eliminate something, but it does happen. Sometimes I simply remove (cut off) part of a project and it then begins to look do-able. By letting a project sit for a year or two, I gain new perspective and can either let it go completely or work on it again.
09-01-2018, 03:18 AM
#39
Super Member
Join Date: Dec 2010
Location: Portage, Michigan
Posts: 7,378
Yes, indeed. I also tossed a table runner. It was a French Braid and so bias stretched, wonkie and out of square that it only took me a couple of days to say "GOOD BYE". I had too many other projects on my to-do list to get bogged down with a little obstinate project. It just wasn't worthy of becoming a UFO.
09-01-2018, 03:26 AM
#40
Senior Member
Join Date: Sep 2010
Location: Delaware
Posts: 945
Well, I have thrown a couple of pieces but never out! Too stubborn to let it get the better me and too thrifty to waste the money. It may not have ended up in the original pattern, but I found a use for it in something else. Even colors I no like get made into community quilts (sorry, refuse to call them charity quilts) I enjoy a good challenge now and then. Heck, I even liKe untangling a yarn pile:-)
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