Another batch of hexie backgrounds ready to go

I took a break from working on hexies last week. I'd been basting a second huge batch of background blues for what felt like eons, and got to the point where every night I'd look at it and think, "I don't feel like working on that today." I would have switched to sewing blues around the flowers, but I didn't have any ready to go. I like to pick the background hexies for a bunch of the flowers, stack the blues for each flower, and baste the pile of blues to the flower with a loop of thread. When I'm ready to sew, I snip the thread loop, and sew the hexies on, working my way down the pile. This way I can sew the background ring in place without having to turn my brain back on to make a "which blue next?" decision with each seam, which really slows things down. This is a slow-enough project already.

Selecting the blues for each flower is best done with natural light on the kitchen counter, as you see here, but day after day last week I was busy with other things and forgot to do it before evening. I finally got around to it Sunday. I've now got about 30 more flowers ready to sew blues to. That may sound like a lot, but it leaves another 30 or so to go, which means I still need to baste more (a lot more!) blues. At the moment I'm feeling inspired to keep going with the basting until all the remaining flowers are ready to have the background ring sewn on.

I may change my mind about that.

Hexies in progress

My plan, now that I've got all the GTG flower centers done, was to arrange them on the design wall to ensure a good "random" scattering of blues/reds/others. I don't dare just wing it as I go along, for fear I'll get 2/3 of the way done and realize I've used all the blues and the result will be lopsided, with too many reds in one corner.

I figured I'd draw up a simple grid with row and column numbers on a piece of paper, and pin a post-it position ID# to each one flower. That way I could work in some kind of sequence, get the blues added to several neighboring ones, add the greens, and start assembling larger units in chunks.

Yesterday I tried arranging some GFG flowers on the design wall, and decided that wasn't going to work. I do need to see the flowers with the blue background ring around each one, like this:

So, my grand plan to break up the tedium of sewing all those blues around all those flowers has evaporated. However, I did figure out that the aspect of sewing the blues I didn't like had to do with the assorted fabrics. I'd sew one blue hexie on, then pull another from the basted bag, assess balance, make sure not to have too many of the same in a row, etc. Each new hexie required attention and choices and made the process feel so s-l-o-w. Plus, since I mostly work on this at night during TV hours, the poor lighting made those decisions harder.

On to Plan B: Sunday morning I pulled out a pile of completed flowers and selected blues to go around each one (nice to do with good natural light). Then I picked the blues all up into a neat pile, in order, and secured to the flower with thread.

Now for each flower I have a pile of 12 pre-selected blue hexies ready to go, no decisions required. These will keep me busy for the next few weeks of TV nights:

Then I'll only have to baste a gazillion-trillion more blue hexies, and sew up about 3 more batches of these, to get this lengthy step done.

Hexies taking shape

My hexies obsession continues, and my vision of a total project is taking shape. For a project that started up as a way to use up some Kaffe Fassett scraps and strips, this has triggered the purchase of way more additional fabric than anticipated. In addition to more KF prints, I now have an assortment of blues, some backing fabric, and a beautiful lime-on-white batik for a border that I'll show you some other time.

Biggest decision has been made: the background color will be an assortment of pale, watery blue batik "blenders":

The blues here are not stitched, as you can probably tell, just nudged into place on my kitchen counter so I could be sure they play well togther as a setting color. Colors in these photos are over-saturated, but I don't feel like tweaking them any more. It's another dim, drizzly Hilo day, not good for pics, even with flash.

I want to include some green in my layout, and had in mind using "triplets" between the flowers, like this:

Now I'm thinking maybe that's too much green, so I'm going to go back to my hexies playground (Illustrator file) and see if I can come up with a layour I like with single greens, maybe something like this:

Clearly I need to waste at least several more hours playing with my graphics layout worksheets. before making a decision. Still lots of basting of greens and blues to be done, and many more flowers to make before I have to commit to anything.

obsessed

They warned me. "It's addictive," they said, and "I can't seem to stop," but did I listen?

It's all American Idol's fault. And Biggest Loser. And our DVR. There's just sooo much TV to sit through on a Tuesday night, so I was poking around the sewing bloggiverse last week looking for some kind of hand-sewing project to work on while in couch-potato mode. Preferably one that would use up some if not most of the Kaffe Fassett prints in my overflowing "charms and strips" drawer. I didn't have anything specific in mind, other than no way was I ever going to make a cathedral window anything ever again. One pillow cover was enough of that for me, thank you.

So I poked around and came across a blog mention (and then another, and another) of English Paper Piecing, specifically hexagons, and specifically the "Grandmother's Flower Garden" layout, and it was exactly what I was looking for. I have fond memories of napping (decades ago, in another century, when I was a child) under a very traditional genuine-from-the-1930s GFG quilt actually made by my Great-Grandmother (surely, musthavebeen, 'cause no way did Grammy every sit down and hand sew a quilt!), which is still somewhere in my Mom's house, though now in tatters.

So I printed up some sheets of 3/4" hexies and cut them out and started turning scrap fabric into smaller scraps and basted away and then made some flowers. And a bunch of green hexies that will be leaves. The pic above is most of what I've produced since last weekend, when the obsession began. I don't know yet for sure what these will become, or whether I'll use that pink "Anemone" KF print as the background or not, but I'm very sure I'm officially hooked on making these little cuties during TV time. It's the perfect lap project, and I just can't seem to stop.

BTW: I'm also close to finishing my first garment for the Mini-Wardrobe challenge, so hope to have  a pic and post on that by the weekend.