Awesome Hour Glass Centers - A Tip

After making 88 plus hour glass blocks, I thought I would share a tip that really helped me keep my corners in line.

If you're interested in making some hour glass blocks I would highly recommend the tutorial from Cluck Cluck Sew seen here. 

First you will need to create the "two-halves" of your double hour glass.  Do not iron yet!

Take the first half and pick a side that you will start to press first.  You will not be using open seams and so you will want to start each side from the same fabric.  Below I decided to start on the side with the Kona Oyster.

Press carefully, but not too hard that you stretch your fabric.  Repeat this step with the second half of the block.  Remember to start pressing from the same colored fabric as the other half.

Now you have your two halves of your block.

Because you pressed both halves in the same direction, your seam is now on the same side.  When you go to match your seam / corner, you now have the creases of the fold to help you.

The creases can be pushed together to help you align the center.  Pin and sew the two halves together.

Press the seam either to the side or open, depending on your preference.

Trim the excess and admire your awesome block centers!

Repeat as necessary for your project!

If you have questions or suggestions for improvement, please let me know!

Fabric Stash Organizing Tips - A Tutorial

Practical Tips to Organize your Fabric:

Do you ever find yourself pinning pictures of how professional quilters have organized their collections of fabrics on shelves in pretty little piles?  If you’re like me, you mouth begins to drool and visions of organized sewing rooms start dancing in your head.  Sounds beautiful, right?  Yes it does!  But is it practical? No!

When pulling together fabrics for a new project I am constantly interchanging pieces until I get the right feel.  Can you imagine if everything was organized in little piles, stacked neatly on a book shelf?  I would go crazy trying to keep those piles in order.  My solution: a set of drawers.

Use a set of clear plastic drawers

Use clear drawers so that you can see what you have without opening drawers.  I love that I can see what each drawer contains; first, because I can admire my collection and second, so that when I need a certain color, I can see which drawer to open.  Saves time and frustration!

Organize by project, then color

It’s as simple as it sounds.  I like to keep fabrics that I have paired together so that I don’t accidentally steal from it for another project.  I designated one of my clear drawers to works-in-progress, or future projects.  The rest of the drawers are organized by colors: reds, blues, greens, browns, … with a category for those fabrics that just don’t seem to fit into any one color group.

My future projects (ahem... or works in progress) are in the prime top drawer for easy access

Here you can see my green stash and my brown stash sharing a drawer

Be disciplined with your system

Whatever system you choose to use, be dedicated to it.  What’s the use of spending all of the time and effort into implementing a new system, if you do not maintain it?  Return a red colored piece to your red section, return the work-in-progress to your designated place.  An organized stash is a happy stash (and happy spouses, too!).

Optional Extra Step:

This extra step takes some more time, but can be quite helpful when pulling together fabrics for a new project.  Label each piece of fabric with its measurements, i.e. 1 yard cut, or 3/8 yard, etc.  One of the easiest ways to label is to write the measurement on a post-it note and then use a pin to secure to the fabric.