All the 2023 Quilty Finishes {Finally!} & A Little Bramble Blooms Progress

 A belated look-back at all the 2023 finishes here at Quilty Folk! Once again, life has gotten in the way of my quilty forward progress. What a shock and surprise, right? I must be human.

2023 Finishes--A

It was a very slow year for quilt finishes, coming in at 10 quilt total. Considering all that went on last year though, I feel like it was an amazing feat. 

2023 Finishes--B

Since I'm throwing this up on the blog for my own benefit, it's probably best to keep it brief.

The 2023 Finished Quilt Details:

• 3 Baby Quilts
• 1 Lap sized Quilt
• 6 Bed sized Quilts
• 9 Quilts totally Hand Quilted
• 1 Quilt mixed Hand and Machine Quilted

As a note of interest, I gifted 12 quilts last year, which is more than I finished. Hmm... You'd think the stacks would be smaller by now? But no. That's not how it seems to work. Gifting quilts is really good for the soul and making friends though, so I guess I'm fine with that! Another item of note is that the quilt top drawers are getting easier to shut. By the end of 2023, there was only 20 tops left and 2 of them were donations from my sister a few years ago. Not really something that I'm stressing about ever finishing if you want to know the truth of it. Like I've mentioned before, they will probably end up as quilt backing some day. I'm just not that invested in them!

Another interesting thing is that I finished quite a few larger quilts last year. With lots and lots of hand quilting. Even if hardly anything else got done, I still managed some hoop time. That's NOT been the case this year. My hand quilting time has dropped to just a couple evenings a week the last couple months. So many things are getting in the way of my quality hoop time. Just drives me crazy, but what do you do? 

Just for the record and journaling purposes: I started out 2023 sicker than I've even been and of course that took awhile to power through and catch up from. Then we had our youngest sons wedding at the end of April. Our oldest daughter had her first child in August and somewhere in the middle was two wedding weekends for a niece and nephew who we feel quite close to. Lots of family shenanigans to attend to as well.

Unfortunately, the year also ended with my husband being sicker than he's ever been and now, somehow we're already in February of 2024. Whew. I'm still right smack in the middle of caretaking, which is not nearly as fun as quilting. We are starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel and feel thankful for any improvements as they are all quite hard won. Thank you all once again for your many messages of love and encouragement in this hard time. Priorities definitely ebb and flow throughout our lives don't they?

Moving along

Starting the Bramble Blooms QAL seemed like an exciting adventure back when the momentum was carrying me along with the inspiration and initial drive. Now, it's one of the few quilty things that I can think about without feeling completely overwhelmed and uninspired. Most days. Maybe just a little bit blank around the edges of my brain sometimes? Or panic that I might be letting you down? Uggh. There's so much to appreciate though: Using up the Oldy moldy fabric, an easy-peasy medallion quilt plan of attack, Improv-ish, open-ended, loosey-goosey style? Nothing to fret about or bother getting overly excited about, right? Except for the issue of time.*sigh

So yeah. Time is definitely problematic these days. Both for finding enough time in the day to do the applique work and then the computer time for posting. Wowsers, has that been a tough one! I keep telling myself that I did in fact warn everyone about the slower pace of this QAL. It's either bag the whole project or just keep plugging away at it and find the joy where it comes. You know me. Gonna keep after it until the challenge runs cold.

The picture above is the current state of my BBI. Both the top and bottom borders have been stitched down and all that is left for stitching on the side panels is the leaves. I have them pinned where they will probably stay. Still deliberating whether or not to remove a leaf or two from the top and bottom border and thinking yeah. Might as well leave them alone now. Afterall, it's extra work to take them off! 

Also, I keep making these flaky little mistakes {so surprising considering my state of distraction these days}. Right now the quarter triangle corner blocks are just a wee bit too small for seamlessly sewing onto the centerpiece. I've already cut the coping border down once, but may have to trim a little more off. Or maybe trim a bit of fabric off of the outside of the applique borders? Regardless, this phase of the quilt is very, very close to being done. 

I don't know about you, but I'm really liking the end result thus far! As per usual, I am a little shocked and dumbfounded by how interesting this older fabric can be made to look. It's nothing new to me as I've had this result before. But it always, always amazes me because in the fabric stack, the whole thing just looked pretty dismal if you know what I mean! 

I managed to squeeze in enough time to scroll though all the blogs and instagram accounts that have been linked up to the QAL. Very exciting work! Many lovely, exciting creations to contemplate and be inspired by! Wish I could be more present on the blogs especially but maybe later. I'm very encouraged by the creativity and courage many of you have displayed in branching out with this strange little QAL.  I'm hoping that if you manage to push through with the details in the first quilt, then my thoughts pertaining to inspiration and the connection to series work will start to coalesce in the 2nd and 3rd. It's a bit of a slog at first I know, but we have to get some foundational work in place before we can begin to build on anything personal.

  

I can't promise any hard and fast date, but my plan is to move directly into action with the next border phase of BBI. There is quite a bit of organization involved so please bear with me. Crossing my fingers I'll have all the details together before the end of February at the very least if not the six weeks I was originally hoping for. Don't be afraid to email me if you have a late start and want to be added to the link list!

Orphan Annie is a Finish and Other Things in the Lineup

 Orphan Annie is a completed quilt top now! So nice to get another one finished up. Still hopeful there will time for another two or three to get knocked off the list before the end of the year.

Orphan Annie all crumpled and cozy looking!

The next picture made the quilt look a little bit washed out. The actual color is more intense like the previous picture. I really love this whimsical quilt with all its imperfections. Somehow this one ended up being so very blue. For some reason I thought it would feel like a green quilt, but nope. Its one hundred percent got the blues!

Loving the mixed print background in 
the blocks

The tulips were cut-outs from behind another quilt {AHIQ Hourglass Tulip}. I just couldn't throw them away. Really interesting to see the flatter looking tulip, all cut out of only two fabrics, made up into something that really shows them off. I just have to smile at making an entire quilt out of a less than wonderful looking tulip shape. Because why not? Don't they deserve a moment to shine too?

Somehow very blendy looking

And then there's the improv. quarter triangle border. It was kind of hard to cut the triangles off at the ends and just let them be. Made for very odd looking corners for sure! Wouldn't change it for anything though as it distinctively comes across as a 'make-do' sort of look and vibe. My all time fave look these days plus it goes very well with the unpretentious look to the tulips.

The whimsical corners!

Next up in the hoop is my 'Positive Thinking' quilt. It's an AHIQ challenge from 2020 involving using old clothes and of course positive thinking. One of my favorite quotes although I'm quite sure the 'willingly' part would not always apply to me in every context of my life!

Next up in the hoop!

I've been dreading doing the hand quilting on this one 'cuz, how to properly stitch the middle of the quilt? But as always, it's merely a case of getting it into the hoop and simply getting started. I tend to make things bigger in my head than reality warrants.

So odd to have flowers without leaves....

I also managed to get Tatterdemalion to a finished quilt top stage.*sigh  All that needed doing was to to sew the last little bits of applique to the middle border.

It's a completed quilt top!

This was one of the faster quilt tops that I have made in years, all of it sewn together in about six weeks or so. I am loving the unusual color palette and the overall moodiness!

The oddities of Tatterdemalion!

Definitely a quilt that is not ever going to take itself seriously. I suppose that's the beauty of starting with orphan blocks, parts and pieces! Absolutely not anything that I would ever have 'designed' if I was sitting down to draw out the details of a brand new quilt project! 

Good use of the orphan bits

Really happy to have found a good place for some of those brownish violet and purple fat quarters that have been piling up in the stash totes too. I can only wish there was enough left to sew the backing together! There's something deeply cozy about a dark backing on a utility quilt like this one.

Can't wait to see this one quilted

QAL details: I've been thinking non-stop about the QAL idea that was thrown out there in the last post. Like I said, the odds were good that I would proceed regardless of interest, but some of the comments definitely got me to thinking about how to move forward. {Thanks for the lovely amount of interest! I am honestly blown away!} How to make it interesting for both beginners and more experienced quilters? Gathering my thoughts and trying to collate them into a semblance of order here. I recognize my hodgepodge way of throwing a quilt together might not make sense to just everybody!

Potential fabric stacks for the QAL

Also, now I'm a little antsy because what if the entire idea bombs and you all end up with hideous quilts? Ughh.  Anyway....  That's the completely compelling thing about making an improv. style quilt right? It's like rooting for the underdog. The outcome could be amazing, but there are no guarantees! All we know is that if the outcome turns out to be wonderful, we'll be even more excited than if we were betting on the sure thing. Or something like that....

So. If you think you might want to do this with me, go ahead and get digging through the stash fabric lurking in the corners of the quilt room. I've come up with these three perfectly normal looking stacks of similar looking fabrics--{you'll want stacks similar to each other, not necessarily to my fabric stacks!} Take a look, nothing stupendous and exciting! Not much in the way of larger yardage either, just a lot of whole and partial fat quarters and the occasional third of a yard.

Don't worry about what you might or might not be lacking till something becomes a real problem moving forward. We'll dig again later if needed! Also, don't worry about coming up with three fabric stacks if you really can't wrap your head around more than one quilt at a time. Or if you want to make three different color palettes instead of the one? Go for it! {I get that not everybody can stomach making three back to back quilts in the same color palette.} The main thing is to try and get a little bit of value change, plenty of various, mixed fabric prints and yeah, yeah, the old adage, lights, darks, mediums, and brights. I really don't recommend stacks of truly hideous fabrics or stuff that makes you feel nauseous. Will try to finish organizing my thoughts and have the start of the QAL ready by the end of the month!

Am still catching up to answering comments, but if you don't have a reply back by the end of this week, then you must be a no-reply commenter. Even if your name is on the comment, if you haven't received a reply from me, then I have zero access to your email address! Loraine Everard, you leave wonderful comments but I can't reach out to you! And there are several more. Apologies for how picky and proprietary Blogger is these days.

It's All About The Process

Lots of applique prep going on this week! It takes an enormous amount of time, but now there's several projects all ready for stitching attention. This is the first awkward tulip {out of three} in the Good Vibes quilt. The stem, underneath circle and one side of the petals are stitched onto this one, still have to stitch the other petal and both leaves.

A little more stitching...

I'll need to stitch the rest of the circles onto their background blocks and then the quilt will probably take shape very quickly after that. Applique is sooo slow and then the quilt top often comes together lickety-split! 

Getting closer to a real finish every day!

I have another quilt with the hand quilting finished up. First phase of the binding is done, just waiting for time to hand stitch it down. Feeling very antsy as there isn't another quilt ready to put into the hoop just yet. I'm having to soak some of the backing fabric so as to ensure that it doesn't bleed all over the front some day in the future.

Just felt like it needed something more...

Tatterdemalion was at the stage of being a completed top when I decided that it probably needed a skootch more applique.*sigh  Why oh why does this always happen to me?

The layout I like best

I found a piece of fabric that really resonated with me {such perfect colors for this quilt!} and decided to echo the shape of the flower over the top of the vase. Uh oh! It wasn't doing quite what I needed it to do, so then I had to hunt for a piece of fabric to go underneath and hopefully help 'pop' the whole motif. Which it does, wonderfully. Yay for progress. 

Playing with layout

I played with a couple of layouts and finally decided on the flower motifs in the corners of the quilt. All going the same direction or some horizontal and some vertical? It was a lot of fun looking and weighing subtleties. I'm sure there are many of you who would rather see them anywhere else but on this quilt! Oh well. It's so interesting when personalities come into play with quilting.

Ready for the hand stitching

Had to start a brand new quilt even though I had promised myself that a quilt top had to be finished up first. Tatterdemalion is sooooo close though! So this one is called 'Worthy'. A little bit of applique to start things out and then it will be all improv. piecing. I think. That's the plan for now, but we'll see. 

On a different note altogether.... I'm also thinking seriously about starting a new, 3-part series with mixed applique, piecing and a little bit of the medallion look too. I have three stacks of very similar looking fabrics in brown, rosy reds, greens and creams. Oldy moldy stuff from years ago, but still, all good, lovely fabrics. The series would play off the similarities and differences of each successive quilt as it takes shape. And bonus! Give a reason to want to play with fabrics/colors that feel a bit tired and stale. Ughh. You know how difficult these fabrics can be when there is always luscious, brand new fabrics calling our name?

The tentative plan is to make it a very loose, casual QAL with simple guidance for anyone wanting to follow along. And I do mean very loose and casual. Like for instance, I will not be telling you exactly how much fabric is needed beforehand. How could I possibly know when I'm making the quilt up as things go along? When I do get things nailed down, then of course I will do my very best to relay that information. Applique shapes would be given in the form of a pdf after personal request in the comments or through my email. The whole project would presumably take a year or two as of course I'll be working on other quilts at the same time. Did you honestly think that I'd just focus on one quilt at a time? The horror!

All of the pertinent posts can {and will} be listed together at the top of my blog in the pages section so that people can take their time and move through the series at their own pace. Any likely takers? Don't feel that you have to respond yes or no, I'm almost definitely doing this regardless of interest, contrary person that I am! Blog reading has fallen way off in the past couple years and I'm super erratic at posting these days which doesn't help. Ha! Maybe this is too ambitious, but it's been something I've been thinking about doing for several years now and the idea just finally came together and clicked. It would be a great way for those of you who want to learn more about how/why/what it takes to work with older fabrics and maybe get the creative process moving and grooving--the Quilty Folk way. Often there is no big, bright lightbulb moments just getting down and DOING it. Changing up a couple elements and playing. Might as well jump on this and see where things end up!

 

A Late Summer Quilt Finish

 It feels so very, very good to finish up with this particular quilt: 'The Mountains Are calling'. Not only because there's been so few finishes for the year, but because it's really ran me through the whole gamut of emotions from feeling rather blasé about the idea until now, when I'm actually rather proud of the cozy, warm vibe to it. Who would have ever expected it to end up this way? 

The Mt's Are Calling is a true blue finish!

This was started in March of 2022, always intended to be a quilt for our youngest son. In an odd twist, the back of the quilt was sewn first. Mostly because I didn't have a very clear picture of what the front of the quilt should look like. Masculine looking quilts? Not exactly in my comfort zone.... 

So glad that I bought the blue woven fabric
for the centerpiece

Our son loves living in the northwest and has always had an avid interest in hiking the high mountain trails. Though I always sort of knew that this quilt should be more of a blue, green and brown quilt, fabric and color options are pretty limited around here the last couple years. A lot of the green fabric languishing in the fabric totes is more olive in tones and I've been trying very hard to use up what I have. {Or at least dig through and start from there!} Olive wasn't doing it for me and this was second choice, these primarily blue and red fabrics. 

Always wonderful to see the spirit and vibe I wanted to convey come through regardless of material chosen for the foundation of the quilt. If I've learned anything in the past several years, it's to try and try again and never give up on what's available right here at home. This time I caved and bought the blue centerpiece fabric because I needed the simplicity of a single fabric background, but nothing else was purchased for this quilt! Making do can give off an authentic look almost impossible to achieve by running out and buying brand new for everything. 

The trees are weird and quirky but just
simple enough to be fun

This quilt was a long hard struggle to get to completion stage. Anyone following along knew that a long time ago. My heart was never really in it like so many of the projects that get started around here. Though I'm happy and satisfied with it now, it never took my muse on a thrilling little adventure the way the more interesting quilts do. Just not the style that I most prefer to work with these days! 

Anyway, by the time I had the details figured out for making this happen, our son was engaged to be married! After a lengthy time pondering, I decided to just finish it up as a 'marriage' quilt. Thankfully my daughter-in-law likes to go on hikes with him too so she wasn't being completely left out. And I did add more pinkish reds to the improv. strips at the front of the quilt after she was in the picture. Definitely more her than him so that's something!

And the crooked compass works too

And.... she has also managed to talk me into gifting her with a much more girly looking quilt in the meantime. Uh huh. DDIL2 already picked it out and hauled it to their new home. You know. Because the 'marriage' quilt was going to be belated! Funny how I can never say no to any of our kids....

Home is where the heart is!*wink

I am especially relieved by the texture on the front of the quilt as wide open spaces always fill me with terror. So dumb. They almost always look amazing when filled with the simplest of quilting lines such as the Baptist Fan motif. The way the lines pop instead of sink into the piecing {such as in the back of the quilt below} should be a lesson to remember forever.

Backing made up of lots of older indifferent
looking fabrics and a few mens shirts too

Believe it or not, the back of the quilt looks much, much more cozy than it does in the picture. Quite honestly, I almost like the back better than the front, which is something that happens fairly regularly around here.*sigh  Improv. seems to fill some need apparently?

I'd curl up in this quilt in a New York minute!

Loving the crumpled, wrap-this-quilt-around-you-and-be-happy vibe to this quilt soooo much. I would have been ecstatic to have this as a finish about 10 years ago and now I'm just sort of bemused and smiling. Yep, I can do this! Even when I don't know what I'm doing. So exciting when the 'me' voice comes through regardless of all the doubting and off perfect color and fabric choices happen. That's where experience and trust in our intuition helps bridge the gaps if we lean into it.

Next up in the hoop!

Next up in the hoop is a palette cleanser of serene greens and lovely pink pops of happiness. It's not a special quilt in any great sense, but the quirky spark to it makes me very happy to have in the hoop.

Should look a lot better with hand quilting

Summer is not quite over here yet so I didn't want to dive into fall colored quilts if I didn't have to. Autumn just needs to wait for its turn. Thankfully my have-to list of quilts is caught up until mid November. Yay! Have I mentioned how grumpy have-to lists make me when it comes to quilting?

Working my way through the middle blocks

Getting back into the swing of things quite slowly, but I'm beginning to accept that it's just gonna be that sorta year all the way till December. We had both of our boys and their wives come see us last weekend {for a long weekend} and had such a great time with the granddaughters especially. They are growing up too fast! Our oldest is making noises about moving back to the state and we are just so incredibly thrilled by that. Crossing our fingers that things work out where we can see them on a more regular basis. Funny how quilting drops down the priority list real quick when it comes to kids and grandchildren time....

p.s. The Legacy of Gwen Marston Exhibition is now open at the New England Quilt Museum. Makes me feel like kind of a fraud, but they didn't send my quilts back with a 'sorry, these won't work' excuse like I half expected. So exciting to have two quilts on display there!  My head is just whirling it seems so surreal. Big thanks to Barb Vedder for spearheading and helping to organize this event. If anyone attends, I would love to see pictures!

Orphan Annie Gets a Border

So this is Orphan Annie with the first border. From the start, I kept thinking that Dogtooth borders might be a good design, especially using the lightning design. That just sort of seemed like the thing to do and I haven't used that layout in forever! If I was thinking more about black or pink for the borders, well, that idea quickly got shut down.

First border on Orphan Annie

When it became evident that the quilt wanted more of those lighter shades of green, I didn't really know what to do. So many of them have been used up at this point! I scrambled around and eventually found some strips of the green batik, leftovers from a recent quilt backing. Thankfully, I had enough yardage of the blue fabric for the relief/contrast color.

Auditioning the borders

I picked a size of quarter triangle that looked 'about right' and just started cutting. Didn't worry about measurements to exactly fit to the quilt at all. After sewing several long lengths of triangles together, then it was time to audition.  To my disappointment, in the initial layout, nothing looked right except for the arrangement in the previous picture. Perhaps I was going to need to add coping strips all the way around to get the proper look?  It was almost enough for me to throw up my hands and try and start over, but you know how it goes. This was an orphan block quilt. Why does it have to look incredible? That gave me just enough impetuous to sew on the first border surround--all in a log cabin style, one border after another.

Orphan Annie is a completed quilt top!

When it came time to sew on the second border, I went ahead and did another 'layout', mostly just checking to see where each border might need to start--with a blue triangle or maybe a green? That's when I tried the 'lightning' dogtooth border look once again, and to my surprise...., it looked really good at the sides of the quilt. Like, amazingly good! Not all the way around the quilt, which is kinda odd, but still. Then I fiddled and fiddled and fiddled, trying to get the corners to look okay. Soooo frustrating. 

Loving the crazy pieced corners

It was only after a couple times of leaving and coming back that I realized the problem. I was attempting to get the corners to come together in perfect pairings and/or the lightning layout in perfect repeats. This quilt was actually wanting a more disordered and make-do look. When I let go and started cutting the edges and sewing the rows with that specific idea in mind, the last rows went together swimmingly. 

Looking across the quilt

And yes, there are definitely areas where the borders fall in a more precise arrangement. That's okay. But believe me, when I say it is totally by accident {and perhaps the fact that my triangles were all cut to the same size}. The thing that really struck me was how much I LOVE the make-do look and yet, over and over and over, I continually fight against that very look in my own quilts. Now, you might see something different in what I turn out, but never think that it just comes naturally. Oh no. It's all very much a work in progress around here!

Looking very cozy

My youngest brother and his wife recently sold their home by the river {hard to raise little kids by a whitewater river}and bought a small cattle farm. During the big move, they had to decide what to take, what to keep as the farmhouse there is fairly small. Anyway, long story short, they called me and asked if I would like to have this brand new sewing table {still in the box}. Yessss!!!

A new sewing table!

Since my sewing machine is slightly larger than the standard size, my husband had to cut a little bit more room in the opening. It's been interesting getting used to having my sewing machine flush with the sewing table and honestly, I'm still not 100% sure that I love that part. It sure looks good though! Always fun to get something new to try out, especially when there's no money involved!

Trying out the new sewing machine position

I finally went ahead and started chain piecing the wedges for the Grandma's Fan blocks, cut out sometime during the winter. There's a lot of blocks in the quilt {over 90?} and so I haven't been in a huge hurry. I'll probably sew the fans onto the background by hand, but now I'm dithering over which color to use in the background position. Lots of white in this quilt and mehh... you know how I feel about that!

Starting to sew the Grandma Fan blocks together

Got all the leaves cut out for the Flower Power blocks. Love the punchy vibe! It's a vintage floral I picked up at a quilt show many moons ago. The last time I used a chunk of this fabric, it was probably in 2018. Very good fabric, but the purple in it goes a very long ways. Wish I could get better pictures of these tulip blocks, but to date, they have been extremely uncooperative.

Flower Power blocks looking better with the leaves

In other news, we have had a rather rough couple of weeks. Some friends in our church were involved in a dispute of sorts and were killed in their home. During Covid, they got more and more interested in going off-grid and getting away from people, resulting in them buying property in a fairly remote area. It was all very shocking and so very, very sad as they were 'salt of the earth' sort of people and the least likely people you could imagine this happening to. 

Only one frame left to go!

Our church members took food, for over a week, to the daughter & husband in the home where she was housing the surviving grandmother and other grieving family members. The grandmother was also living at the remote location at the time of the tragedy, and had thankfully managed to run away and hide. She was severely traumatized as you can only imagine. It's surreal and mind blowing this could happen to such good people. There was lots to be done as to relocating animals and plants etc. and much more needed in the weeks ahead. Obviously the grandmother will not be comfortable living there now and the house will have to be cleaned up and sold. My husband was asked to officiate the memorial services and our church members rallied around and provided a dinner afterward, all on the Saturday of a holiday weekend. So much love and really, so very little we can do for them. It's hard when tragedy strikes close to home with people we genuinely care about. I cannot even imagine how devastating it would be to be the daughter, mother, father, grandparents in this situation. 

As usual, when times are hard and there is lots of heavy thinking to do, I tend to pick up the hoop and put in the hand quilting time. Many times through the years we've been married, my husband thinks longingly about living off grid and 'getting away from it all'. If nothing else, this event proved to us that when the world is in such a state of apprehension and turmoil, there is not a lot of safer places to be. I wasn't even going to mention any of this, but it has made me feel very sad, lethargic, helpless, moody--you name it. So yeah. Don't feel sorry for us. We're not the ones who got our lives upended in a brutal, senseless manner. We are absolutely, positively looking forward to getting to spend a week with our kids and grandkids here in a couple weeks. I'd say it's a very good time to bring on the hugs!

Working It Out

I can almost feel myself start settling in to the regular routine of normal quilting habits. Almost. Why does it take me so long these days to adjust back to the usual ebb and flow of things? Probably has to do with the state of the world around us. All the uncertainty wears on us in so many different ways. So nice to burrow down into our cozy little world at home and soak up the good things.

Orphan Annie working itself into a quilt top

It took me several tries to finally settle on the sashing details for 'Orphan Annie'. I knew the colors needed to be somewhere in the darker blue/green ranges, but the design and piecing of it {or not} simply eluded me. 

Loving the mixed up, pieced backgrounds

Once I made the determination to use this Ikat fabric, then it all just sort of fell into place. At first it didn't look like there was nearly enough fabric left for sashing purposes, but I resolutely kept whittling away at the proposed width of the strips thinking 'this has to work!' Eventually the numbers gave me the right answer and yay! I could start cutting.

When first auditioning the strips, I laid them willy nilly as to where the black stripe bits ended up. Soon it became one of those questions of 'what if?' and then I was busily rearranging them to make a secondary pattern in the quilt. It's nothing super obvious or in your face. Just something to make me smile when zooming in. Look! There really are more interesting details buried here and there!

All the tulips just a little bit different...

When stitching the cut-out tulip shapes, it was difficult at times not to try and trim some of them to a more pleasing shape. Now I'm glad to see the subtle differences and yes, imperfections in the quilt. Makes for a more homespun, utility-like look. Which of course I love and adore and think is the very best thing for all quilts worldwide. Ahem. Not that you'd ever hear me say horrid things about your perfectly perfect quilts...

Some of the green background fabrics are from the late 90's and early 2000's. I caught one fabric with little bugs on it that I'm sure made it into a baby quilt for a friends son. Uh, hello? Isn't he graduating from high school this year? 

Alas, Orphan Annie isn't quite done yet, though the quilt is trying to tell me that YES, it is!*stomp, stomp  Right now the measurements are around 46 x 57 inches or something and that just doesn't do it for me. So impractical. Borders will have to be added on, period. End of story.

A Tisket-A Tasket a completed top!

Now, A Tisket-A Tasket is a quilt top that is finished up, totally completed until the sandwiching pinning phase. After adding this last larger hst border {red plaid fabric from one of my dads old shirts}, I'm calling it good. Doesn't feel like there's anything of benefit to add on at this particular stage and I definitely can't add on more of the lighter yellows that I so, very much wanted to use. Back in the stash totes they went. Oh well. Another quilt, another day, right?

Corners of the blue border looks better now

Some of you might not love the addition of more gold in the outer surround, but actually, I am fairly pleased with how it 'pops' the blue in the previous border. With the later addition of a binding, it should all come together fairly gracefully. You know how little borders at the outside of a quilt sometimes get drowned out? I do want this one to sing!

Looking cozy, just like I like 'em!

I had to take out the hsts at the corners of the blue and red hst border after adding on the outside border. Too much confusion. The solid blue squares better help to transition from one border to the next. Which, speaking of that blue fabric. Ughh. It is such a lame fabric, I almost can't believe that I'm using it! But you know me. Always trying to use up the old fabrics and this one was the very best color from all that I had to choose from. I am constantly amazed at how hard the most unexpected fabrics can work for a quilt if we just give them a chance!

By issue of working with so many older, uninspiring fabrics, I am definitely learning new things all of the time. The biggest takeaway is not to take any fabric for granted. Ever. Be willing to take the strangest chances with fabric prints and blends of colors. Sooo much more focus on color, tone and shades. Here's a goodie....Paying more attention to the amounts of each color as to the current quilt. Some colors just look amazingly better in mismatched pairings. Go figure. 

And that's such an easy thing to do, changing the quantities and percentages. A tweak here or there and wallah!, things start smiling and having fun. The conversation has begun! It's like I'm constantly on this roller coaster of  'Anyone can clearly see that this is the most uninspiring stack of fabric in the whole world!' Why bother? Then there's the other extreme. That's where my instincts are practically shouting at me to stop taking the lazy view and endeavor to look for the hidden potential. That's the leap of faith that often feels stupid, hard {time consuming?} or pointless, but that actually causes THE change.

There's another issue that crops up occasionally. I've discovered how much better an entire stack of marinating fabrics can look if you can just find that one, super yummy looking fabric that pulls it all together. So silly, but occasionally it's like the difference between turning a light switch on or off. I'm not even kidding. No matter how cohesive the fabrics and colors look together and you know it should work, it just doesn't. Not really. There ends up being this boring quality that permeates everything and it's incredibly hard to overcome. Seriously, it's almost painful. I work and work and work and all I'm doing is spreading the boredom around to fit into a larger surface. If perhaps this magical piece of fabric can be found??? {whether it be a print, special color etc.}, it's utterly fascinating how the whole quilt will suddenly start to feel charming, interesting and maybe even a little bit intriguing. You sly little bugger! Now how precisely did that happen? And I really, really don't understand the why exactly, but hmm... so much more willing to try and duplicate the experience in the next quilt, because I can SEE and FEEL the results!

Looking at the gingham for a potential binding

I'm truly enjoying this stage of my quilt journey. Can you tell? Yeah, it's different, but I'm wholly throwing myself into trying to make really good stuff from fabric that I used to would have gladly passed over. Maybe even backed up the car and run over again. I was {still am} a proponent of buying fabric that we LOVE. It's important to have a good foundation of fabric that speaks to us. But what if we don't have the money in our budget to do that anymore? Or what if we're trying to be more thoughtful about our fabric consumption? Or maybe we're always ready and willing to take unwanted fabric off of a former quilters hands? All of those things are me today and I'm okay with that. 

This journey of intentionally digging deep into the totes and making do is not always easy. It doesn't always, evermore without fail, feel fun and exciting. On the other hand, I want {need} to keep quilting and learning. This way is deliberate, it can often feel slow. Sometimes I start with pieces that don't make sense or feel astonishingly uninteresting. Like, can fabric/blocks/piecing truly be soooo unappealing as to be hopeless? We wonder. I puzzle over that and try to imagine what it would take to light them on fire. Is it even possible? The design becomes less of the end goal and more of a side effect. This adventure has definitely taken a detour in the last couple years and instead of burning out with it, I feel like I'm just barely getting started. And that's where my excitement lies these days. Maybe I'm crazy, but it feels like my quilting voice is getting distilled and refined into something that feels even more authentic than before. Not in every single effort of course. But overall. Hey, I don't know about you, but I'm just gonna roll with it....

Maybe The Solution Will Come To Me If I Take a Nap

I've been working on the border for the A-Tisket-A-Tasket quilt. Lots of hst's which are not difficult, just annoying.

Trimming the hst's

Before sewing them into rows and getting locked into something I don't want, I went ahead and auditioned some ideas for the next border after.

Auditioning some possibilities

Definitely loving the red and blue hst's, but the rest is slow going. I had this idea to use up a lot of that really light yellow oddball fabric. Maybe in random 9-patches etc., but noooo it's not working. So I switched to applique ideas which, funnily enough is not working either.

Nothing looks right

Will have to leave it be for a bit and come back later. In the mean time, I finished up all the hand work on the Orphan Annie tulip blocks. All 20 of them! They are looking very yummy I think. Those olive green colors used on the leaves are just enough different to make me smile.

Hoping these look good together in a quilt!

I finally remembered to check back with the inspiration pics for the Country Stars quilt. It's a blend of two patterns from my inspiration folders. Both published in the early 2000's?

Original inspiration

It was all started as a quilt for someone and so I used colors and a style that I thought they might particularly like. The hand work is 'next on the list' so here we go. Definitely wanting to move on to more intriguing projects!

Should have left it alone....

When I started stitching down the leaves everything in me just rebelled. Ughh! I just hate doing sharp curves and there would be so many? So without really thinking it through, I cut four of the leaves down to a more simplstic shape.

All the weird shaped leaves

Yeah, it was probably a bad, bad idea. I've only stitched down four leaves on the right side, 1 large one, 2 small ones and 1 large simple shaped one and it's looking pretty iffy already. My regret meter is pinging off the charts.

Might have to get the seam ripper out

I threw some berry shapes on the quilt top {oversized on purpose} and am not sure if it all looks better or just more train wreck. Why do I ever think it's a good idea to make things that I'm not feeling the love for? Somewhere the seam ripper is calling my name, all the while laughing its head off....

Loving these colors together

I've been hand quilting on the AHIQ Hourglass quilt lately which has made me think about all those languishing hourglass units. Hhmmmm....  I made that first batch the wrong size so had to start over. Yeah. It was a very fun and relaxing couple of hours pulling fabric to put with them. Not sure what's gonna happen there, but I could tell my heart was all in.

Preventative maintenance

One of the results of digging through all those marinating fabric stacks in the past couple weeks--totes and buckets of fabric soaking. There's a gorgeous green fabric that had just a little bit taken out of it, looked so bright and bold. Uh huh. It's been releasing dye for almost three days now. No worries. I only used it in my Coronacrazy quilt.*sigh