Friday, December 16, 2016

Starting the Tent

The Holiday fabric I bought online for Millie's tent was supposed to arrive at work a week ago Friday. But Friday was our annual Holiday party, and nobody was at the building to receive it. Then on Monday I had to leave early for an appointment, so I only received my package on Tuesday.

The fabric had to go through the washer and dryer, and then be ironed before I could start cutting out the pieces.

One of the pieces - the casing for the legs of the tent - needed to be cut four times. Working with a tissue paper pattern is frustrating enough, but moving it around four times seemed a bit absurd. On a whim, I measured it - exactly four inches wide, by 29-1/2" long. WELL! I'll tell anybody at work that while I don't mind working hard, I don't like working stupid. I have a plexiglass ruler exactly four inches wide, so I folded over my fabric and used the ruler and my rotary cutter to cut two pieces in less time than it would have taken me with the tissue pattern. Then I did it again to cut the last two pieces.  I did make one other change.

One of the thing that always annoyed me about the tent was the base. The right side of the fabric faced down, and the wrong side of the fabric showed on the inside of the tent.


Even covered with a pillow you can still see the wrong side of the fabric. I decided I wouldn't do that again, so I cut an additional panel for the bottom of the tent. You can see it in the second photo. It's contrasting fabric of tan and gray.  Works for me.

I made the original tent way back in 2007, and it didn't take me very long, so I'm going to take a quick break from the slab triangles to finish this up.  I've got a nice red flannel for the pillow. I hope Millie is pleased.

There is, of course, no guarantee!

4 comments:

Glen QuiltSwissy said...

I am sure
She will be please! The Bad Basset Boyz would LOVE tents! Well most likely McGee would throw his around the yard a bit........

Megan said...

I've seen plenty of pics of Millie's tent over the years and never noticed that the base fabric was wrong side up! LOL You might have just flipped it over when making this second one, instead of installing another layer.

Megan
Sydney, Australia

Quiltdivajulie said...

Really like that new fabric -and a RED pillow cover will look so good!

Carol- Beads and Birds said...

These tents were a big deal around here back in the '80s. I made several to sell at craft shows back then and sold every one of them. My grandsons each had one and they loved them so much. They are a fun and easy project that stitches up quickly.
xx, Carol