Didn’t it feel good to sew again?  Great use of fabrics.  The first quilt is my favorite…but then, I like all quilts…hee heee.

rick will be leaving soon and gone a couple weeks.  I anticipate much sewing time while he is gone.

Nice quilts. Look like you had fun. At least your DH holds your quilts up without too much fuss unlike mine.

very nice, love those colors of course.  Piecing is so relaxing to me.  no decisions to make, just sewing.

I started on the Nova quilt this evening.  I don't think it would work well in novelties, so I decided to do it in red/white/blue and donate to a veteran's group that I quilt for.  Love the secondary star.  And apart from needing to press the diagonal seams open, very easy to sew.

Gosh, that is *so* pretty!   What a great block.  It's going to look terrific when assembled into a quilt!

Is that the name of the pattern Nova? I sew for the VA ALSO.

The pattern name is Nova, by GE Designs.  here is a link to the PDF download pattern https://gequiltdesigns.com/products/nova-pdf-10-square-pattern?_pos=2&_sid=6c986090b&_ss=r

and here is a link to the video - tho it goes very fast.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ocwQ_j2rpoQ

That is really going to be pretty  

Just received this pattern in the mail!  With a cruise coming up on 9/16, not sure when I'll start it but sure do love the pattern.

Sometimes, I am continually astonished at what a complete idiot I can be.  I have no idea what I was(n't) thinking when I made my original calculations on the size of my current Forever Project.

It's the Dillyflower project (also known as a HexDen.   Dillyflower is a better marketing name!)  The finished block is a BIG hexagon.  All of the hexagons nest together.  This makes estimating a finished size a little tricky.

In a NORMAL (square/rectangular) block, all you need to do is measure the width & height, then multiply by the number of blocks in the rows and columns.  No big deal.  Not so nested hexagons.   Here's a picture of nested hexagons. 




The *height* is straightforward .... from the top to the bottom.  The height of my block is 11.25" (finished).   The *width* is more problematical.  WHICH width do you use?  from point to point?  or the base seamline?   Neither one is accurate because of the nesting.  Eventually I decided to use *2* nested columns (the blue arrow). That's still not 100% accurate because a little bit extends beyond the blue arrow on the last column ... but close enough for estimates.  Let me state at this point, when I was starting this project, I had NOT figured out these measurements.  In retrospect, even the *height* would have been useful.  But, oh no ... I didn't measure it.  This ignorance came back to bite me, big time.

I made my graphic mock-up using EQ.  I probably used the finished measurements that EQ calculated, which is the ONLY thing I can think of that makes any sense.  Using EQ's calculations for size, my quilt top needed 12 hexies vertically and 11 hexies horizontally (nested).   Since January of this year (2022), I have blissfully been making Dillyflowers of the various colors and the background hexies to applique the Dillyflowers on to.  Just this week, August 2022, I finished all of the color flower blocks I needed.   [My idea is to have columns of Dillyflowers, alternating between color flowers on a neutral background and neutral flowers on a color background)

While the Dillyflowers are EPP and hand appliqued onto the background, I am machine piecing the background hexies together.  Last night I stitched all 12 blocks of the same color flower together.  Hmmmm.  It sure seemed kinda *long*.  It was at THIS POINT, I measure the height of the finished block.  It was 11.25".   OK .. now let's do some basic arithmetic.  12 blocks  times  11.25"/block yields .....  HOLY MOLEY .. 138".    THE TOP WAS GOING TO BE 138" LONG????????   I don't THINK so.  Cripes.

Aside: long, long ago, after quilting my 2nd king sized quilt, I vowed (in several languages) that I would never, ever make a king sized quilt again.  There is just TOO MUCH real estate to deal with.  Never mind that I also had at least one other king sized *top* waiting.  SIgh.   However, the take-away here is that NO MORE king sized tops.

What size is a more-or-less standard king sized top?  You'll find different specific measurements but the cheat sheet that I have used for years tells me a king sized top is about 106"x106".   Anyone with half a brain will immediately see that 138" is waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay beyond a king sized top, even if you add in a  pillow tuck amount!

SIgh.

I now needed to refigured how many blocks I needed ... and let's make this a queen sized quilt.  Still big (at 86"x100") but manageable.   I knew with a sinking feeling that I would have "leftover" blocks ... blocks that I didn't need to make in the first place!   Good gosh .. all that handwork that I didn't need to do!  Sigh.

Anyway, recalculating for a queen sized quilt, I have determined that I need 9 blocks per column.   9 blocks times 11.25"/block yields 101" in height.  Good enough.   Now for the width .. again, it's a little trickier but using the 2 nested hexie figure, I came up with 4 sets of hexies.    4 hexie sets times 20.5"/set yields 82" in width (plus a tad more).  Good enough.

Yes, I have some leftover hexies.  Ugh.  Those will be repurposed into a smaller quilt.

Truly ... what an utter idiot I am.  Although I am rather pleased with the Dillyflower blocks, I would have happily NOT MADE all those 'extra' blocks.    The positive note is that while I *do* still need to make all of the neutral Dillyflowers on a color background, I now *KNOW* that I don't need to make as many as I did before!