Bedding Plants QAL 4 – The Fan Flower Row

Part 4 of the Bedding Plants QAL is the FAN FLOWER!  Everyone did so well with their poppy blocks and managed all those curves perfectly. So now it’s time to dip our toes into the FPP water…

I know FPP can be scary for some and TBH it can be tricky at first. I have taught this many times and students can get confused to begin with. Some students start to panic and others hate it altogether. But if you are calm and logical and patient with yourself you will get through that difficult starting bit and will absolutely love it by the end! The point is if you do find it a struggle to start with then that is only to be expected, you are not stupid, you are totally normal!

There is a section on FPP in the book which should be a big help but I will also try to take you through the process with a little more detailed instruction and room for a few more images here.

But first Let’s take a look at this gorgeous bundle of Art Gallery Fabrics I will be using. This is ‘Velvet’ by Amy Sinibaldi and I received a Fat 1/8th bundle from the UK distributors the day before I needed to start making my small project. I knew it would be perfect for these flowers and though the sizes were a little tight at times I just had to use it.

Fot the small project this row I will be making a large tote bag, using this tutorial on the blog.

IMPORTANT

One other important thing I wanted to mention is a slight mistake in the layout diagram in the book. This shows sashing strips between the fan flower blocks. These don’t actually exists! This was picked up by my dear friend Dolores who is taking part in the QAL. She was looking ahead at the cutting instructions and spotted that there didn’t seem to be enough sashing strips specified for this row.  The cutting list is in fact correct but the diagram isn’t. This is actually the first mistake I have apotted (well Dolores spotted!) in the whole book, but at least the instructions are fine, just a slightly misleading diagram.

Foundation Paper Piecing

My first piece of advice is to press all your fabric pieces.  In the book cutting instructions I suggest sizes to cut for the FPP. Mainly we are using 5″ strips for the first template.  I didn’t have big enough fabric for the length suggested in the book so I cut 2 shorter lengths.

Initially one of the things people struggle with is the question ‘which side of the template goes with which side of the fabric?’.  If you think about this logically your fabric needs to go against the non-printed side of the template. If it goes over the printing you can’t see the lines which defeats the purpose of them. So the wrong side of the template goes against the wrong side of the fabric, as shown below (top left – photos go clockwise on these mosaics).

The first thing we need to do is free up a piece of our fabric to cover section 1 PLUS at least a quarter inch seam allowance over the line into section 2. This needs to be a piece of flower fabric. I start off with my template on top of the wrong side of my fabric leaving that quarter inch seam over the line between sections 1 and 2 . Even if you don’t understand anything I am saying just follow exactly what I do in the photos and it will eventually make sense!

I then roughly cut around the outside of the template to free the piece of fabric. This piece of fabric is not attached to the template on it’s own, it only gets stitched in place on the template when joined to section 2.

Flip both template and fabric over as shown above (bottom right). Take the edge of a background fabric strip and lay it RST on top of the flower fabric, lining up raw edges.

Now flip all this over again so you can see the lines on the template. Make sure that those 2 pieces of fabric are still together along that raw edge and that there is still a quarter inch seam allowance over the line (you should be able to see through the paper enough for this). Pin from this side if you like.  Turn your stitch length down to 1.5 (to make it easier to remove papers) and stitch along the line between sections 1 and 2. Make sure you stitch all the way to the end of the paper (through the seam allowance) on the curved edge. This will make your curved piecing much easier.

Flip it over again and open out the seam. Press or finger press this. Now flip it back over to the back (with the seam still open, as shown above, bottom left) and we are ready for trimming! This is the bit that everyone forgets. If you are in the middle of FPP and you are suddenly stuck and don’t know what to do then I can guarantee that the answer will be ‘trimming’!

Get a piece of card and place on the line between sections 2 and 3 and fold the paper template over it (below, top left). I use an ‘Add-a-Quarter’ ruler which is designed especially for FPP and has a little lip that butts up against the card. You simply trim along the ruler and it adds the quarter inch seam.

But you can use a regular ruler too, as shown above (bottom right). Once trimmed flip back over and repeat! Lay the edge of your flower fabric strip RST with the background piece and flip over and stitch along the line between sections 2 and 3. Flip over to open out seams and press, flip back over and trim using the card and ruler as explained above. Just keep going like this until all the wedges are pieced.

If you are using solid fabric you can flip your pieces over to make the most of the angles when lining up the next piece.  It’s more tricky with printed. I used either end of the fabric strip to start with. When I got on to template B I had the perfect angle ready to go for this mirror image template.

This is a nice easy way to start FPP as the pieces are regular sized and only connect with each other on parallel sides. The leaf section is a little trickier but we will get to that in a minute.

Once you have pieced all the sections on the curve there is one more little triangle to add. I have given you the size of piece to cut for this so it should be nice and easy. You will need to trim your edge before adding your triangle.

Now it’s time to trim the whole template. Press well then turn to the back. Use a square ruler to trim the right angle and then cut around the curve with your cutter.

You can now remove the papers from this template. This isn’t always the case with FPP as sometimes sections need to be pieced with papers still in place for accuracy, but not these as now you need to add the curve background. Refer to the previous QAL post (poppy) for curved piecing instructions.

Let’s take a look at those tricky leaves. Rather than starting at an edge of the template you will need to start with a section in the centre for this one. Aagain I have specified a size of fabric piece.

Lay you template over your fabric as shown to get the awkward angle to fit. Fold back on the line (without shifting the template, it is not stitched as before so you will need to be more careful with it) and use the card and ruler method to cut the piece that will cover section 2. Now flip all back over and lay your background piece RST along the line between section 1 and 2,

Make sure you will have enough fabric to cover section 2 by holding it in place with your fingers (or even pinning) before flipping over the background fabric to check. It is very easy to think you have a piece big enough but due to the awkeard angles around the leaf it may not actually cover the whole thing (plus those quarter inch seam allowances). Those tiny stitches are annoying to unpick and sometimes I don’t bother but will just add an extra piece of fabric on to cover the missing area as shown below.

Once all your FPP templates are complete and you have added the curved background to the flower head you have a very easy 4 part block to put together.

Just make sure you get your two flower heads the right way round. They are designed to make 5 equal sized wedges.

If you are making the quilt then you only need to sew the blocks together in a row as there are no sashing strips between the blocks, only strips at the end of the row (see my IMPORTANT message at the start of the post). 

Tote Bag

I made four blocks so that I could have two each side, one on top of the other.

I trimmed all but a quarter inch away from the top of each flower as they were a little too big for the tote bag.  They ended up 9.5″ (unfinished) .

I sewed the two blocks together then added extra strips either side which measured 2.5″ x 18.5″.

This made the finished panel 16.5″ x 18.5″.  I cut two pieces of lining fabric the same size and I interfaced both main fabric and lining (optional).  The AGF fabric is very fine and I thought it needed a bit more stability. I don’t usually do this with a tote bag but this being on the large side I thought it might help with durability too. 

I followed my tutorial for the rest of the bag, cutting my straps to the same length as specified there. But as this bag is wider I spaced them an extra inch from the outer edge (3.5″)

The tutorial was written back in 2014 and I have learnt lots more since then! 

There are different ways to make the tote bag and though this method still worked perfectly fine for me you might like to read the comments below that post for some extra tips, especially Benta’s.  I particularly like her straps suggestion and have used that on other bags since.

I’m very pleased with my pretty roomy tote bag. It’s perfect for attending events like the upcoming Festival of Quilts. I’ll be able to get tons of fabric shopping in there! 

The Fan Flowers Sponsored Prize!

Our sponsor for part four of the QAL is Queen of Fabric UK. Emma has donated 6 x fat 1/8ths from the range of beautiful fabric in her store plus a retractable measuring tape.

Queen of Fabric opened its doors in Melbourne Australia in 2017 and in 2020 Emma came to London to launch the business in the UK, too. Queen of Fabric specialises in bringing the very best of Australian patchwork to the world, and has an eclectic and vibrant array of fabric and notions for all your patchwork needs. Emma also launched her own Bespoke Liberty Tana Lawn collection in 2020, which is a career highlight to date.

You may remember I used some of Emma’s bespoke Liberty fabric for one of my Daisy pouches in part 2 of the QAL. Please do go check out her store here!

To enter the giveaway all you need to do is use the hashtag #beddingplantsQALfanflower when you post your Fan Flower blocks in your feed on Instagram, or share your Fan Flower blocks in a post in the Bedding Plants QAL Facebook group. I will choose a random winner from the combined IG and FB posts of Fan Flower blocks. You have from now until midnight BST Sunday 18th July to share your Fan Flower blocks on either platform. I will draw a winner on Monday 19th July and post in both places.

Well I think that’s a wrap for this latest Bedding Plants QAL post! Remember as your host I am here to help, so if you have any questions just comment below or send me an email to [email protected].

Looking forward to seeing all your beautiful Fan Flowers!