"The Seminoles are American Indians that live in the Southeastern United States in the States of Florida and Southern Georgia. Seminole quilting originated from the Seminole patchwork used for clothing by these southeastern Native Americans. In the late 1800s it was a long trip from the Everglades to trade for cotton cloth so women began sewing strips made from the fabric left on the end of the bolts to make what was know as "strip clothing". It involves sewing solid pieces of fabric together to form designs in strips. These strips are joined together to form decorative bands of fabric which are often used in skirts, blouses and other articles of clothing. Often quite a variety of colorful fabrics are used in a single garment." From article found on: http://www.eldrbarry.net/im/meg/semstyle.pdf
So I decided to try and make a diamond border here are my steps. I first cut 3 strips of fabric 1 1/2" wide and sewed them together.
Next cut the strip into 1 1/2" pieces and when you go to sew them you have to step them as I have shown in this picture. The tricky part here is once the two pieces are stepped, when you start to sew, if you start at the end you are sewing on a single thickness of fabric which often wants to get sucked into the machine, even with a throat plate that is designed with just the small hole for the needle. So what I ended up doing is starting each piece part way in so unfortunately you can't chain piece these.
Once it is pieced together and ironed this is what it looks like.
This is what the diamond border looks like with the poppy.
So this project is now on hold since my fabics are on back order. Hopefully I will get them within the month.
4 comments:
OH Yes! That diamond border looks perfect with your poppy. I know what you mean about the fabric getting sucked in. My machine does the same thing. One thing that I find does help is to have 2 folded over strips of fabric about 3/4 to an 1 inch long (after being folded). I use one of these pieces at the start, stitching through it, then I have my actual project ready to feed into the machine right after it, I use the next strip to put right after the project. This way it catches all my thread tails, and is ready to start the next project stitch. Did that make any sense? I hope so. I find having this in the feed dogs already, having my project ready to go in after it prevents it from being pulled down into the bobbin.
I cannot wait to see this poppy project finished, it really is beautiful!
That border is lovely. Back ordered? Bummer!!! Don't you hate it when you really want to get sewing on something for that to happen?
I agree with VH that a leader/ender is the best way to avoid those problems. Check out what you can do with them too: http://quiltville.com/leadersenderspf.html
The diamond border is perfect! I love the effect. Starters and enders might be the solution, but you would still have to sew them one at a time with a s/e in between I think. I must try this out.
Love the way those pieces come together to make the pieced border. While it might be a pain to sew, it is surely going to save a bit on the cutting side of things. Looks great and I really like the scale of the border to the poppy. What a pop.
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