Road 66 - the second row

I had a lovely comment from Katie. She wrote "I noticed some half hexagons along the upper edge. I assume that the tails are left out as in diamond construction. But how do you keep the longer edge tucked under. Mine always wants to pop out. Is there a trick to this?" I was unable to email my answer because Katie is a no-reply blogger. This simply means her email address isn't linked to her blogger profile. For those of you who are new to blogging it also means that if you enter contests or giveaways by leaving a comment, you won't be entered because there is no way to contact you should you win. If you are looking to fix this there was an excellent tutorial on Quiltville's Quips & Snips. But I digress! Katie is asking about the construction of my Road 66 quilt which is named after the quilt in Di Ford's book Primarily Quilts.

The answer to Katie's question is that the tails are sticking out of the half hexagons (inside the red circles) for two reasons: the first is the shape of the paper and the second is to accommodate the border that will be added. The half hexagon has a "diamond" point and that is a sharp angle (30 degrees) and the tail is created because the point is narrower than the seam allowance This is not the case with a hexagon which is a 60 degree angle which is wider than the seam allowance. I could have basted my diamond and half hexagons so that all of the seam allowances are folded in such a way that there are no tails.

I wrote about that basting method here. The diamond would look like this from the right side. Notice there are no tails.

This is what it would look like from the wrong side. I generally use this method because it gives me a sharp point which makes joining the pieces much easier. Having to deal with that tail and move it out of the way is fiddly work so if the seam allowances are neatly folded in they aren't a problem.

However, I've left the tails when I prepped the diamonds and half hexagons of my Road 66 quilt because I want a straight outside edge on my quilt so that I can add two borders, one narrow and one wide. When I remove the papers and fold out the seam allowance I'll have a nice straight edge to which I can attach my borders. If the seam allowance are tuck away neatly on the wrong side as in the pictures above I run the risk of catching the edge of the fabric so that there is a little pucker and the seam allowance won't open properly.

So row 2 of my quilt is now stitched and ready to be added to row 1. Three more rows to go and I still have to make filler half hexagons for the top edge! Sew, sew, sew!

So one final comment: I reply to every comment left on my blog although as of late I've been slow in replying due to other commitments. However, if you don't hear back from me it means you are a no-reply blogger. Unless you update your profile or send me your email address I will have no way to contact you. Rest assured I do read and appreciate every comment left!

That is it for today; until I post again, happy sewing!
Karen H