Thinking about possibilities....

.....for changes to the pink/turquoise blocks so that they aren't quite so prominent compared to the other blocks.   I'd like to keep them in there because I know who made them and would like something from her on the front...........and not just in the label on the back.

One thought I've had is to add WOW triangles to each block after frog-stitching the groups.    Finished block to look something like what is shown in the middle of this pic.   blocks could be arranged in multiple ways so the spacer sections would not all be the same.  

What i'm not sure tho is if the turquoise settles down to a more 'decorous' level....lol.  

How do you think the possibility looks?

Gratitudes -

1. beautiful weather
2. A God who knows what is happening in my life even when i have no clue about what will happen in the future.

Considering.....

....someone in a small group that I'm a part of posted a comment about the colors of blocks in the block robin - particularly the turquoise/pink half-square blocks.    Her comment was to the effect that the blue really stood out among all of the other colors in it.

Now this is something that I had wondered about but at this point haven't made up my mind on what to do with the block sections.   The cross stitch piece that this started with does not have any blue in it.   The two turquoise-greens are in there, but not a turquoise-blue.

Am waiting to "hear" what the quilt says it wants because I'm not sure what I want to do.   I have pulled a fabric that will work as binding in the tonal family as the greens that are there now.   But should I use some of it to replace the turquoise blue blocks - that is what I'm debating now.

Any thoughts out there?

Gratitudes -

1. Labor Day Holiday - No School!!!!!

2. Tests from the past two yrs being available to edit and tweak for classes this year.  =)

Two more blocks made....

Two more blocks have been made for the block round robin.    The replacement star was made with some of my fairy frost stash.   It still needs to be bordered with more of the WOW that I used for the background to bring it up to 9" finished in size, but I need to find the WOW first since I used scraps for the background.  

The flying geese were made with some of the pinks that I'd pulled out and sent at the start of the swap.

Am still playing with layouts and thinking about what to add next to fill in the open areas of the quilt.   Maybe an applique block or two before finishing with some small filler blocks.

Graditudes:

1. AC that works both in the house and the car.
2. A nice bed to sleep in and three alarms to wake me.... =)

New Setting Block Posted

The second of the three setting blocks has been posted and can be downloaded.   You'll be making 4 of these blocks for the quilt top.

You'll find the block pattern here -
http://thequiltedsnail.com/bom2013-14.html



Gratitudes:
1.  God's supply for all my needs
2. Good students this year

Silent Quilt No Longer.....

I don't know about how quilts behave for anyone else, but mine are all too often very "talkative", sometimes even "yelling" at me about what they want me to do next.   All too often the first few ideas that I have for a set of blocks just doesn't make them happy and they refuse to cooperate with me as a result.   No, they aren't live creatures but there are times when I'd swear they all but are for the way that they don't want to work the way I think they should!

At the present time I have two different quilts in process that are behaving like this.   One is my London Tea towel quilt and it has been banished from my design floor at the moment because it just doesn't want to cooperate with me.   Obviously I'm not listening well enough but the ideas are hovering in the background so maybe soon.

However, I did pull out one that has been sitting in 'time-out' for a couple of years because it had refused to cooperate with me.    This is a block robin that I did with some friends that I'm in an online quilt group with.   I always have a lot of fun with them and love being in round robins with them because they do such great work.

This block robin started with a piece of cross-stitch that I finished back in 1990.   (Yes I have oodles of cross-stitch UFO's in addition to all of the quilty ones, but that is another story all together.   LOL)  Since getting the original blocks back in 2011 I have not made any progress on it because I just couldn't get them arranged in a way that I liked.   Pic to the right shows how it looked as of the last time that I had tried to arranged the blocks and sections.  
Last night i finally figured out that what was tripping me up were the pink/turquoise blocks that were arranged around one block.   That arrangement just kept the focus on that single block instead of playing nicely with all of the other parts.

Once I finally 'heard' what the quilt had been trying to tell me all along (ok so I'm  a wee bit hard of hearing and stubborn at times) then the answer was apparent.   So frog-stitching was the first order of the day today to remove the half-square triangle block border strips.  Once that was done then I could rearrange the main blocks again and start filling in the gaps with all of the filler blocks that I already had.

Next up was to make a 9" block that brought more of the yellow from the cross-stitch into the quilt.  For that I made an Ohio Star block with yellow points and a gold center.    Next up to be made are a 6" block for the bottom left and about 7 - 3" blocks to fill in the bigger areas of the top.   I'm still thinking about what to do with the star at the upper left.   First thought is to take the turquoise framing strips off and replace them with WOW's ones.   I'm sure that the quilt will let me know if it doesn't like my first idea....or the second one.....or third......lol.    I'm just glad to be finally making progress on this critter.

Gratitudes:
1.  Good kids in all of my classes this year.

2.  For the extra income over the summer that has helped make ends in the budget meet better.

Downsizing thoughts and Questions

The new school year has begun and the first week has been completed.  And with the new year comes the realization that after this year is complete I'll be free to find another job that will pay enough to fully support myself.    So I'll be working on my resume and getting it updated for the first time in about 4 or 5 yrs.  

I will also be working on going through things here at the house and downsizing.  I've already got a bunch of stuff that I've pulled out and have set aside to sell.   Still debating on how best to do that.    Some of which will be listed on ebay, other stuff will go onto a For Sale page on my website.

I'm wanting to sell some of the many quilts and wallhangings that I have here, so they will also be listed for sale somewhere.  

My question to all of you - when you look for things like quilts and other similar things how do you like the listings laid out?