Jelly Roll Race 1600 experts? I need your help!
I looked around on the web to see if I could find answers to these questions & couldn't find any so I'm turning to y'all. There is so much knowledge here on the board & everyone is so eager to help so I have high hopes.
OK... my questions. I want to make (another) Jelly Roll Race quilt. I just made one but want this one to be "better". The 1st JRR I made was with a roll of 40 strips (2 sets of 20 each in the roll) that I seamed on the diagonal. I also cut about 18" off one of the strips (I read someplace that doing that would make the seams stagger). The first question... how do I make sure identical strips don't show up next to each other? I thought I staggered the duplicates throughout the piecing but several duplicates ended up being next to each other. Do you group the duplicates closer or further from each other? I added a 2" inner border to the quilt (I was waiting to get the outer border fabric until I looked at the top & saw what I thought would be best with it -- the narrow border is another batik altogether that really is a good accent). Now the top measures 56 X 61. That's not a good size (to me). I like my quilts more rectangular (to use as a blanket). When I sew on the outer borders, should I use different widths for the top/bottom side pieces (does that make sense?)? Or just use equal widths & hope for the best? And how wide would you make those outer borders? I'd thought about 4".
OK, now to the new JRR. I have 2 identical jelly rolls to use, 40 strips. But 2 of the strips in each roll (4 in total) don't exactly float my boat so I don't want to include them. Do I just go with the 36 strips or do I add in more? I have extra fabric so I could cut more strips (granted, then I'd have even more repeats, but...). I want this top to be more rectangular (it's a gift & I'd like the recipient to be able to use it as a blanket). I don't care what directions the strips/seams go in. I just want a rectangular quilt & evidently am too dense to figure out how to do that (I'll bet math is involved & me & math don't like each other so good... LOL!). Also, the fabric I have for the inner border is really bright (tho it looks good with the other fabrics) so would it be OK to just do a flange of it instead of a 2" inner border?
I really do like these quilts & since I need to make several lap-sized quilts rather quickly, they seem perfect for that (tho it's taking me longer than an hour or two to make mine).
On that note, if you weren't aware of it, cat-on-a-mac just added a JRR page to the gallery... yay!
THANK YOU in advance for your help with this. I know I'm anal & weird when it comes to my sewing (& you'd think as long as I've been quilting that I could figure this business out on my own). I just like my stuff to be the best I can do (especially when these are for other people -- even if those people are strangers to me).