Wednesday Sewing - Grandmother's Flower Garden Pillowcases Part 1

I had a wonderful weekend sewing away on Grandmother's Flower Garden blocks!  And I'm still addicted!  If you've also been making the flower blocks (see last week's post here), now's the time to start putting them together into fabric.  This could be for a quilt top, tote bag, about anything - I'm making pillowcases.  If you're making something else, the directions for these can be adjusted to make different sized fabric.

Materials:
*15 Grandmother's Flower Garden Blocks (instructions here)
* 120 connecting hexagons
*1 yard cotton muslin
*1 yard low loft batting
*1 1/2 yards wide eyelet lace to go around the pillowcase opening - any wide width you like will work

When I put together my first pillowcase, I somehow got off on the white connecting hexagons causing quite a bit of ripping out (hate that)  and much gnashing of teeth (also hate).  For the second pillowcase, I made a diagram on hexagon graph paper showing how many white connecting hexagons need to be sewn onto each flower block so that everything matches up.  The heavy black lines show one flower + its connecting hexagons.  This is designed so that when side A is sewn to side A, you will have a tube of fabric.

I've also put this in a pdf file available here in case you want to print it off.

1.  Lay your flower blocks out, arranging where you want the different colors to go.

2.  Using the chart, sew connecting hexagons to the first flower block.  Just like when you made the original flower blocks, do not sew over a seam (go right up to it, though) and lock the sewing when it begins or ends at a seam.  This will keep your points sharp.

Move on to the next block.  Again, using the chart to see where they go, sew the correct number of hexagons onto the second flower block.  Pin it to the first block.

3.  Continue on in this way until you have all the blocks pinned together.

4.  Sew the expanded blocks together.

I'm quilting my pillowcases, so I'm not going to connect side A to side A until I have that finished - I've never tried to quilt a tube, but it doesn't sound real fun!  If you're not going to quilt yours, you can go ahead and connect the two sides now.

Next Wednesday, we'll machine quilt this piece and finish up the pillowcase.

Happy Creating!  Deborah