Seaming a Backing for Taupe Black White Gray

Seaming the backing for my taupe, black, white, and gray top took me all day. Yes, one seam took me all day. Sigh... piecing goes so much faster for me. My top is 83" long. I had 5 ⅜ yard of backing fabric. Half of that in inches is 96 ¾" so I certainly had some breathing space, even with making my backing 4" longer than the top. But I wanted to match the seam so I fiddled around with where the 12¼" repeats would fall, and cut the backing fabric into two unequal lengths. The familiar saying is, "Measure twice and cut once."  The first length was 87".  I did not cut the remaining yardage until after completing my seam. Manipulating 5 ⅜ yards of fabric was a struggle and I spent a lot of time checking and rechecking my calculations. There must be an easier way because my cautiousness sucked up a lot of my time.

Then there was the question of seaming along the length, matching the motifs. It is not like I could simply put the two selvages together and zoom down, voila! Maybe the fabric was a drop match vertically but I need to shift the fabric horizontally to match the motifs. The stitching line was a different distance from each selvage. I drew lines through matching parts of repeats on the right side of the fabric on each of the two lengths. Sewing along those lines should hide them.

Then I folded the upper length of fabric on the line and pressed the crease in. The crease would be my guide for the stitching line when I sewed from the wrong side and could not see the pencil mark. The pins set the alignment for the cross grain of the fabric along the stitching line.

  

I double checked that the two lines aligned and then sewed on the crease line. The crease line is shadow dependent and not always as crisply clear as I would like it to be. A possible future improvement to my method could be to repeat drawing that line on the wrong side as well using a light table or to insert carbon tracing paper underneath when I draw the original pencil line. I still think I would double check that the lines align with each other periodically as I sew a few inches at a time.

Things were going along swimmingly and then my machine started making an odd sound. I traveled along, hoping it was a brief anomaly that would self-correct; but I stubbornly and stupidly traveled about 8" before I turned it over to check it out. Something had been mis-threaded or come unthreaded. Note the ragged loops.

All the extra loops were from the top thread not the bobbin thread. The upper thread might have slipped out of the tension discs, or when I had to change spools, I neglected to be sure the tension discs were filled properly. I re-threaded the top thread, and I took out and re-inserted the bobbin as well. A few inches of stitching on a scrap confirmed that all was well again and the problem disappeared. Luckily such loose loops spread apart easily and could be easily clipped with thread snips.

And I had just been to a Sew Day for my guild where I was given this handy dandy scrap bucket so I had a place for all those thread snippets I had to painstakingly remove. The tape measure and scissor buttons are adorable on two of the three folded over sides.

The button on the third side is a sewing machine.

The base is triangular and the print is an adorable Minnie Mouse floral. I must admit if you have to rip out, a cute trash collector makes the task so much more pleasant.

Back to my backing seaming. I distract so easily. The uneven sides of the seam allowance show up clearly in the next photo. I scratched my head on whether if I had shifted the fabric lengthwise half a fabric repeat would it have matched. If that possibility were to indeed be a successful alternate approach, the "how" eluded me. I had no problem with cutting off the excess. My top is 63" wide and even with my margin of 4" added to that, I was still less that a double WOF, about 84". 

Once I steam-set the seam, I trimmed the allowance to ¾" and pressed to one side.

The matching came out pretty good – not perfect in all places  –  but pretty good overall.  Once quilted I believe it will be further camouflaged.

I am truly grateful that when I cut the batting it does not need to be seamed nor matched. I buy bamboo batting by the 10 yard, 96" wide roll from Winline Textiles and they ship for free. I will cut it 2" longer in length than the top and 2" wider in width. Doing so allows me 1" wiggle room on each edge. Tomorrow or the next day, I will moan and groan as I crawl on the floor, spray basting the three-layer sandwich together. But I am determined not to lose momentum on this project!

Taupe Black White Gray

Those colors sound dull, don't they? They do to me. Nevertheless, in one of McCall's Quilting magazines, the Spring 2013 edition of America Makes Fast Quilts, a neutral-toned quilt titled Odds and Ends surprisingly caught my eye, even with the unexciting (in my opinion) hues. 

Unlike the quilts on the magazine cover, Odds and Ends is made from a dark gray solid, a light gray solid, and nine fat quarters in white, taupe, black, and grays. I tend to favor brights and jewel tones and will be drawn to pastels occasionally if in the right combination, but generally I avoid beiges, browns, and blacks. Here are the last two quilts – and perhaps the only two quilts –  I made with gray or beige in them: Orange and Grey (8/10/16 post) and Oh Boy (2/21/19 post). Note that even then, I cheated by adding a bright orange or bright turquoise so neither quilt is far from neutral.

 

I knew if left to my own devices I would not buy neutral fabrics on my own but I liked the overall effect of the quilt. The taupe in the fabric line seemed warm enough to make the black and gray welcoming, the white brought brightness to the palette, and the pattern had a modern feel to it. So I bought the kit offered in the magazine to stretch my color palette and tentatively venture into the modern regime. Can something seven years old still be considered modern? Plus, I also may have been stuck in the same color palette for even longer than seven years! It is time to break the mold. I made up the following sets of four blocks each that showcases each of the nine fat quarter fabrics. Each fat quarter makes four blocks. There will be one left over because the arrangement is 5 x 7 blocks and so I need only 35. The first twelve blocks (three sets of four) contain a large-scale two-color floral (left), a two-color mini-print (middle), and a dark two-color bold abstract (right).

The second twelve blocks contain a large-scale three-color light background floral (left), a two-color mini-print (middle), and a light two-color bold abstract (right). The light two-color bold abstract will be repeated in the binding.

The third twelve blocks contain a bold stripe with chevrons with a modern vibe or men's suiting vibe (left). Although it is masculine it is softened with nearby florals. And yes, I did fussy cut so the stripe was centered. (I also fussy cut the mini-print in the center of two previous photos. I really have a problem with being random.) The large-scale three-color dark floral is repeated in border (middle). I omitted one of those blocks in order to meet the 35 block limit. A large-scale three-color medium-toned background floral completes the array (right).

When joined together the blocks alternate in horizontal or vertical format so their light gray frames appear to interlock. The pieced border was interesting with inserts that served as completion pieces for the light grey surrounds on two sides of each block.

The assembled quilt top measure 62½" x 82½". It will be the largest quilt I have yet attempted on my Handiquilter Sweet Sixteen sit-down long arm. The name Odds and Ends does not excite me, so I will be thinking up a different one. The quilt looks to me like it has a lot of windows or picture frames so I will ponder along that path of reasoning.

While I have momentum, I will prepare the binding. Then my next step will be to piece the backing for the top. I was grateful I had purchased the optional backing yardage with the kit. It saves me from an excuse to procrastinate at this point, as I am prone to do. Hopefully I will not lose steam when it comes time to layering the quilt sandwich.