Lesson Learned...

Exact 1/4" seam on block on left. Regular 1/4" sewing foot block on right (smaller). 

You may think that it doesn't matter whether you're stitching consistent 1/4" seams, but today I can tell you. It matters.

You may also think that it's cool to be working on two quilts at one time, going back and forth between the two. It's not cool if you're stitching an exact 1/4" seam on one, and just using the measurement of the 1/4" foot as your seam guide on the other. And, then you forget to reset your needle between projects.

I completed twelve Scrappy Dresden plate blocks using the 1/4" machine foot to define the seam allowance. At the same time, I had determined where my machine needed to be set to sew an exact 1/4" seam on the Farmer's Wife Blocks. (Once I knew where the needle position needed to be for that project, I hit the "memory" button on Miss Ellie to default to that setting whenever I turn her on.)

Significant difference when using two different 1/4" seam measurements

Having completed those needed dozen blocks, I laid the Scrappy quilt components on our guest room bed to decide how I wanted to position the blocks. Once they were previewed, I realized that I needed six more blocks to fill in where I was originally planning to place empty blocks. (Too much "empty" on those blocks.) Back to the sewing machine I went.

I put together all six blocks, hand sewed them to the background fabric and pulled out my centers, which were ready and waiting. But, wait...what the...? This isn't right. The centers weren't fitting the plates. They should have, as I made them all at the same time and the others fit the original dozen blocks just fine. I finally thought to place one of the new blocks on top of one of the originals to see if the plates were the same size. No. They. Were. NOT! The new ones were too big!

I sat in front of my sewing machine trying to figure out what I'd done wrong, when voila! I realized that I hadn't reset my machine between the Farmer's Wife settings and my Scrappy Plates settings.

I pressed "reset", selected fabrics and laid out another plate. I made a test block on the new setting to confirm what I thought I'd done wrong. I sighed a sigh of relief when I checked the new block against the originals. (They matched again.) Then I sighed a sigh of "mild peeve" realizing that I'd need to make six new blocks.

I made the new plates yesterday, and I'll spend the next couple of days stitching them to the ground fabric...again.

I think I've learned two valuable lessons:

• In future, use the same 1/4" criteria on any projects that I work concurrently, and
• Think twice about working on more than one quilt at a time

My goal is to finish the piecing on this quilt next week. Then, I'll concentrate on the Farmer's Wife quilt blocks!