Spider Web Quilt-Along ~ Part 3 ~ Cutting and Sewing the Spider Web Curves

Time to Cut and Piece Some Curves!

I used my Quick Curve Ruler,  but this could be done with a small plate.

If you have a preferred curve ruler, this may work as well.

To learn how best to cut and sew with the QCR,
I am going to refer you to this link from Jenny @ Sew Kind of Wonderful who developed this quilting ruler:

Quick Curve Ruler Tutorial Videos 

 I watched these several times and read all the instructions that came with the ruler before I cut and sewed that first time
and found them to be very helpful.
I do not cross my hands over each other, as Jenny does when she holds the curved pieces for stitching as it does not feel natural to me.
Try different ways of holding and feeding the curves
to find what works best for you.
Sew a few practice scrap curves if you are using this ruler for the first time for this Spider Web Project until you feel ready to go.

Then ready, set, cut and sew!

  1st cut

First, align your ruler in the center and along a straight line

on your black border.  Cut!

You will have 8 of these crescents

These are not scrap!

You will be cutting and using these for the curved webbing:

1st cut this crescent into two long curved strips.

Then cut a tiny curve off the bottom of the small piece.

you can also cut these pieces by folding in half

and placing the center of the ruler on the fold.

Time to cut the triangles!

This is the cut that took the longest for me on the first one until I felt ready to pick up the rotary cutter.

Find the middle of your triangle and place the curve of the ruler over the section with three pieces.

Align a mark on the ruler with a straight seam.

I used the bottom seam to align this cut.

You want to avoid cutting the seams,

but you can make this cut anywhere else in this section really.

Just pick the same place on each triangle.

I aligned the edges of the curve just above the seam line.

... and cut!

last curve cut!

Place the ruler on the section with two pieces, find the center,

align the ruler on a straight line.

I used the top seam for aligning my ruler for this cut.

 Repeat for each triangle section and lay your pieces by your machine

as in the above photo.

Start sewing by turning the longest curved strip over onto the outside piece, right sides together.
Match the middles of this pieces by folding the pieces in half and lining up the fold marks.
(Sorry I forgot to take a picture of this one)

You can pin this part if you want but I did not pin at this time.

For the next seam, you may want to pin.  I did ...

try to line up the seams on the cut charms as closely as possible.
Pin as needed ...

Remove pins as you sew!

 Add the inside smaller curved piece in the same manner.

Fold over, sew; then fold open.

Turn the small tip of the triangle over the sewn piece and sew again.

Your triangle units will now look like this.

I pressed toward the black strips for these seams.

Trim each of the 8 triangle units.

As you can see, in this one the cut charm squares do not line up "perfectly."  

I do not sew "perfect" but I try to sew "good."

If this bothers you, pick out your seam and resew.

I only did this for maybe one or two matched seams.

This was one of them ...

I actually "fixed" this one by picking out a few threads and realigning and sewing again, although it still is not quite "perfect."

"Good" works for me. :)

The trickiest part is done!

Part 4 ~ Adding the Spokes and Piecing the Top

Here

If you have missed any installments in this

Spider Web Quilt-Along,
 Links to all the steps may be found here! 

:)