I’ll be numbering my progress posts for the Diamond Quilt from now on.  Where does one go after “Even More Diamond Quilt Progress”?  It’s time for numbers to take over.

Since last time I added a border of hunter green hexagons to one of my large diamonds.  While adding that border I was basting about six hexagons at a time and then adding them to the border.  After finishing that one border I decided to get the grunt work out of the way and baste enough hexagons to finish the hunter green borders on the remaining seven diamonds.  I got out my calculator and discovered that at 56 hexagons per border this would mean basting 392 hexagons.  At 1.5 minutes per hexagon that came to 9 hours and 48 minutes of cutting paper pieces, fabric squares, basting, and trimming.  This was broken up into sessions of an hour to two hours each over the course of a few days with no other quilting activity taking place.  I completed all 392 hunter green hexagons, and they now sit in their own bowl waiting to be added to the quilt.

I noticed as I was basting that when the needle came up from behind my work that it was sometimes hitting the nail of the thumb that was holding the fabric in place on the paper.  I didn’t notice until it had chipped away quite a bit on the nail.  I probably would not have seen this happen if I hadn’t been basting so many hexagons in succession without other activities in between.

I am continuing to link back to Jessica’s Monday Morning Star Count at Life Under Quilts.  She brought up the subject of how long it takes to piece one’s work.  She has estimated that it takes her about one minute to do a one inch seam when piecing.  I am not sure how long it takes me to do my seams, but my best estimate is about 1.5 minutes per seam based on timing some small units I completed in the past.  My timing may have improved since then.

My goal for this week is to add the hunter green borders to at least three of the remaining diamonds (168 hexagons).  I also want to time how long it takes to add those borders and see if I am doing any better than my estimated 1.5 minutes per seam with my one inch seams on my piecing.  I don’t intend to rush when I time myself.  Piecing hexagons is a peaceful activity.  I just want to know what kind of time I am investing.