Amazed.  Grateful.  Humbled.

Those three words describe how I felt as I prepped for our first Crafty S.T.E.M. discovery club meeting last Friday afternoon.

Amazed that the flash of inspiration I had during a seminar on e-textiles at the ISTE conference in Atlanta back in June was about to become a reality.

Grateful that administration had enough foresight to let me do something I am totally passionate about (and NOT library related) for my club activity.

Humbled by the friends, family and anonymous donors who so generously gave to completely fund my request for soft circuit supplies on donorchoose.org.

All I can say is, “Thank you.”

Psst:  It’s really all about what looks good to you and how big you have to make the quilt.

Like other areas of quilting, there are some mathematical formulas to assist in determining border size:

1)  Golden Ratio:  Finished size of most commonly used block x 1.618 or .618 = finished border width

2)  Rule of thumb:  1/2 to 2/3 the largest block in your quilt

3) Fibonacci numbers:  0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, etc. (helpful for determining proportions for multiple borders)

For example, in the memory quilt I’m currently making, my blocks are 15″ finished with 2″ finished sashing and contrasting cornerstones between the blocks.  I was going to add my standard 5″ finished outer border, but it didn’t look right – it didn’t look big enough.  Nor did it even come close enough to the 72″ length the customer preferred.

So, out comes my trusty calculator:

Using the Golden Ration, my finished border should be:  9.25″  [This actually put the quilt at 71″x71″]

Using Rule of Thumb, my finished border should be 7.5″ to 10″

Using a different Rule of Thumb, my border should be 1/3 of the finished block or 5″

Scratch #3 – even with the 2″ sashed inner border, it’s still too small.

So, I booted up EQ7 and plugged in the numbers to see what was the most visually appealing

Golden ratio was most visually pleasing, but I didn’t have enough fabric to do that, so I cut 8.5″ wide strips instead.

If short of fabric, I could’ve used the Fibonacci numbers to determine the sizes of the pieced borders – 3″ and 5″ to make that 8″ border I wanted.  The quilt will finish about 70″ square with binding, so I think we’re good.

Help support the Crafty STEM club at my school by making a donation to our project page on Donors Choose.

We’re about 1/3 of the way there.

Challenge:  If you pledge before 9/27, use the code INSPIRE at checkout and your gift will be matched up to $100 by an anonymous donor.

Thank you for supporting the creative crafters of tomorrow.