Tutorial: Making a hexagon star my way - part 1

It is hexie weekend over at Quilting Readers Garden. You can see what people are working on and add a link to your blog where you can share your hexie projects!

Today I thought we should make a pretty hexagon star my way using my foundation English paper piecing (EPP) method! I've got a wide variety of stars but I thought I would begin with a simple star that is very well suited to beginners.

I started with six 1" hexagons for the star points and one for the center. You can find a master template of 1" hexagons here. Print a sheet of hexagons. Make little registration marks 1/4" from each corner. Skip down to the next horizontal hexagon line and make a registration mark at the 1/2" mark. Skip down to the third horizontal hexagon edge and make registration marks 1/4" from each corner. Draw a diagonal line that connects the 1/4" marks and the 1/2" mark. Draw a diagonal line to connect the other set of registration marks.

Cut out the hexagons plus one more for the center of your star.

For the star points you will need six pieces of fabric that measure 1 1/4" by 2 1/4".  For the fabric on either side of the point you will need twelve pieces 1 1/2" x 2 1/2". If you are a nervous sewer you can always cut your fabric a little larger than called for so that you have some play room. Place a tiny dab of glue stick on the wrong side of the star on the paper hexagon and place it on the fabric making sure that there is at lease 1/4" of fabric beyond the base of the star. Place a thin ruler or a piece of cardboard on the line and fold back the paper.

Trim off the fabric leaving a 1/4" beyond the fold. You can just eyeball the 1/4" and trim the fabric with scissors. This is your seam allowance. Repeat on the other side.

The next step is to sew the side panels. Shorten your stitch length on your sewing machine.  With right sides together line up a background fabric with the right hand side of the star point. Stitch the seam from the tip of the star to the base. Start sewing onto the fabric and sew right off. Fold the fabric open and press it open with a hot dry iron. You can now trim the excess fabric with scissors so that you have at least a 1/4" seam allowance on the right side. The basting is much easier if you have a generous seam allowance. I work with a seam allowance of at least 3/8".

Also trim the seam allowance to roughly 1/8".

Repeat this process on the left side of the hexagon. This is what you'll end up with!

Tomorrow I'll share a few basting tips and then I'll stitch the star together! Until I post again, happy sewing!

Karen H