All the 2021 Finish-It-Up Details and Looking Ahead At What's Next

It was a strange, bewildering year. A lot of us yo-yoed between depression and keeping our head down, just trying to get through. Why even bother with anger when the energy could be much better spent stitching our way to some sort of tranquility? Once again, I have been ever so grateful for this colorful, fascinating, soul-soothing hobby of mine. Though I often felt like the days were aimlessly drifting by, the 2021 finished quilts tell the real story. These hands of mine were busy, busy, busy....

I've been feeling a wee bit guilty about one particular quilt that never made it out of the quilting queue, but hey! What about that HST Medallion quilt? Huh? It finished at 102" square and the whole thing is hand quilted. Woohoo! And then I made up for all that effort by continually choosing out quilt tops that seemed easy as pie to hand stitch. Hmm... 

The baby quilts kinda took precedence this year as one of my nieces, my sister-in-law and also our daughter-in-law all had new additions to their families. The other baby quilt finished this year was the boy quilt. Of course, everyone decided to have girls this one teensy moment when I was actually on the ball and thinking ahead.

Another quilt that somehow insinuated itself into the line-up was Rhi's quilt. It was the lap quilt my oldest daughter asked me to make, starting from a cut up sundress she wore in her middle school years. It's one of the few quilts I've made with a large-ish amount of green included. One that actually turned out to be relatively successful. Yay me! Given another half dozen or so of 'green quilt attempts' and the dial might eventually be turned up to 'amazing looking'. lol  Working with green can be hard!

Okay, Details please!:

If you're wondering, the past year saw me bring a grand total of 16 quilts, plus a slew of doll quilts to fruition. Slightly less than in years past, but not too shabby considering that our family hosted a wedding and also had a new grandchild! I hoped to bring down the number of quilt tops languishing in the quilting queue, but alas, that number stayed fairly stable at 23. Apparently I reliably alternate the act of finishing up, with all kinds of excuses to start anew. See my worried face? Yeah. Neither do I.

Here's the 'finished' quilt statistics that I'm always looking for at this time of year:

• 11 Doll quilts 
• 4 Baby quilts
• 5 Lap-sized quilts
• 7 Bed-sized quilts
• 13 of the quilts were hand quilted
• 2 of the quilts were mixed hand and machine quilted
• Only 1 quilt was totally machine quilted {plus all the doll quilts}

Another number I generally keep track of is how many quilts are given away. This year saw me gifting 12 quilts, either gently used or new. As usual, there were/are mixed emotions in giving away so many of the quilts that I've poured myself into, and no doubt, spent countless hours working on. Some people are easier to gift quilts to than others and I'd never suggest it's a mandatory thing. I'll just link to an article written in 2013 by Mary Fons where she makes the point that 'Quilts are love, manifested.' When we find the perfect person {or reason} for one of our quilts, it's truly a beautiful thing.

As for what's on board for the new year? 

• More from-the-stash quilting for sure. I'm sincerely hooked--line and sinker. It's beginning to get more and more challenging as certain colors and tones are starting to be depleted. Still, I rather enjoy the adventure of make-do-till-you-can-make-it-work. 
• Absolutely more focus on specific colors where the stash tote lids don't close as well as they should. Gonna have to bite the bullet and attack browns and tans at the minimum. {Whether I want to or not.} Grr.. How oh how to make that seem fun?
• There is still an ever-growing list of applique projects that I'm yearning to dive into. Most are very simplistic with lots of repeats. Yawn.... I don't know why this is so appealing to me, but who cares? If it drives me forward, then I say it's probably worth the effort and needs to happen.
• I don't think there was a single project started from the scrap bin last year. That needs to change. Scrap bin quilts are just too interesting to write off completely. The main thing holding me back is the sheer amount of work involved in the doing.
• The Adhoc. Improv. Quilting party is still ongoing, and in fact, there is a brand new challenge issued for the new year. Definitely one that I intend to dive into, especially as this one pertains to playing with color. Should probably {deliberately} choose a color palette that includes brown...
• As usual around here, squirrel projects tend to beget other squirrels. 2021 will undoubtedly see me continuing on in some form of series work, whether it be playing with the cut-outs from behind my circle quilts or adding appliqued tulips in a slightly different style and shape than used before. Probably gonna see another basket quilt or two, and maybe even another log cabin quilt. The world can always use yet another log cabin quilt, right?
• More hand quilting with perle cotton thread is a given, at least until the outside world settles down into something more 'normal' and truck-loads less stressful. Oh, who's kidding who? I'm gonna hand quilt until my hands give out or I get too old too see. The thing is, I'm not going to worry about trying to push myself into more and more finishes with that faster method of machine quilting. Especially during this particular season of my life. The only time I don't crave snacky things is when my hands are busy with a quilt in the hoop. Can you imagine how large a person I'd be but for this craft? Uh huh. Bet you thought we all got the extra padding from the extra quilting time....

On a different note, after deliberately shedding a few minor responsibilities this past year, I have now allowed myself to be talked into doing a short series of quilt meetings with our church group. We will be making a simple, scrappy, improv. sort of baby {or sm. lap sized} quilt from start to finish, with yours truly as the teacher. Ahhhh... What a muddle that will be. Part of me doesn't want to do this at all. Period. End of story. But the other part of me thinks that it's important for women to have connections. Interactions. Community. Doing that while creating can be enormously nourishing to the body and soul, which obviously, might be a boon after the past two years?

I thought we'd have three or four women at most who were interested, but as of yesterday, we're up to ten.*sigh  All ages and states in life and involving all levels of quilting and/or sewing experience. The only stipulation I made is that everyone need know how to competently sew a straight stitch and be able take care of their own sewing machine issues. Yikes! So far out of my comfort zone with this. Though I'm not 100 percent an introvert, I'm way more of an introvert than an extrovert which makes this feel a little painful. And I personally hate to be told what to do in quilting. How can I 'teach' a method without doing that? So many questions. Am currently trying to walk through the entire quilt project and make notes; emphasis on the basics and trying to leave room for flexibility wherever possible. Wish me luck!

Starting the Summer Out With a Finish!

 Lots going on here as usual, just not much in the quilting department. I've spent the last two weeks either getting ready to go camping, actually camping, or cleaning up from camping. Whew! So much work, especially after a year off and kind of losing sight of the tips and tricks that make things more efficient.

Rhi's dress quilt is done!

I'm talking about the annual church campout thing we do clear up in the mountains. It takes place at an old Boy Scout camp and most every structure is somewhat primitive. That's why it's so incredibly important that we take our RV, so that at the very least, we have a decent nights sleep!

Started the spiral stitching at the center of the sunflowers...

Yah, I'm not much of a camper, I admit. This year I didn't even bother to take my quilting, 'cuz it just never happens. But I walked miles and breathed in lots of fresh mountain air, got to see my grandkids and fed lots of teenagers. No cell service so of course everyone HAD to unplug. 

Really enjoying the overlay of texture

I was hoping to have this quilt done for my daughters birthday on May 28th, but alas, there was just too much going on. It's the one that I started just for her earlier in the year, based around a pretty sunflower print sundress she wore as a very young teen. 

This is probably the only area I don't like...

I started with a pile of fabrics that I thought would look good with the sunflowers and then worked up a rough draft of an improv. style quilt. {Does anyone else find the absurdity in having a rough draft of an improv. quilt?} I didn't succeed in using all of the print, though it feels like enough was used to create the happy, summer vibe feel that I was aiming for!

Love seeing the back. It's a poly/cotton
piece of fabric and feels so light!

The design of the quilt is very free flow with most fabrics cut into larger chunks wherever possible. Mostly I just cut them and then started placing them here and there, until things looked alright. The coin border was added after it became obvious that there needed to be a better transition in certain areas. Though not a super stressful project, it didn't need to look ugly!

Just a fun, cheerful looking quilt. Hope my daughter
loves it as much as I do!

So glad my daughter bought me the compass to experiment with on her quilt. All along I was crossing my fingers, hoping and praying that the spiral quilting lines would help camouflage wherever the design of the quilt lacked! I have to say that this improv. thing is quite addictive, especially when using up some of the older fabrics that don't feel particularly impressive all on their own! And yes. In the event you were wondering, all of the fabrics minus the sunflower dress fabric and the backing fabric, came straight out of the totes. Some are old, some are newish, and many have felt hopeless auditioned anywhere else. Love using them up!

Finally, a quilt with lots of green that feels 
like a success!

I thoroughly enjoyed how in-the-moment the process was and how very, very forgiving it is too. There are a couple baby quilts coming up on my horizon and I'm so very tempted to throw caution to the winds and just chunk the fabric up and then start trying to piece them back together! It's been such an odd year.I find myself making way too many cutting errors and/or finding problems with all the math. Short term memory and stress overload probably, but it is what it is.

Roman Stripes in the hoop

I wasn't getting any help moving the dining room table and so the next up 'in-the-hoop' is this smallish lap quilt from a couple years ago. All I had room on the floor for! It's kind of a boring quilt and the stitching isn't going to be impressive either. Oh well! Just need to have something in the hoop to relax my mind at the end of each day. Someday I'll get caught up again and probably end up turning to wholecloth quilting or something equally ridiculous!*wink

Still Quilting

 Yes, I have been almost completely out of the loop. Life has been full of unexpected happenings, many appointments, a funeral for a family friend, taxes being finalized, Google Chrome crashing on me, and on and on until I wanted to scream. Just let me quilt, please.....??

Sweet Hospitality ready for the last phase of binding!

But then I catch myself and think, honestly, I wouldn't have it any other way. Life with family is the good life! If it's messy and busy, so be it. All the busyness does a number on my creativity though, and then it's good to have those fallback projects that are either hand work based or more formulaic in nature. And I mean that in terms of the end 'goal'. 

The Centerpiece of the quilt

Like this string tulip AHIQ prompt. There was a certain expectation of what this quilt might include, whether I chose to follow all the perimeters or not. It didn't take quite as many twists and turns as Kaja's marvelous version, but since my brain has felt sort of wooly lately, it wasn't quite as straightforward as it could have been! In fact, for a bit, I worried that 'my voice' had almost got lost in the shuffle. 

AHIQ String Tulips quilt top is completed!

So many times, the only thing that matters around here is what the fabric, centerpiece, or perhaps vibe of the quilt wants to convey. I'm on a journey to do what the quilt seems to want and need! This time, I kept being pulled back into the spirit of the challenge and what that might possibly mean. How that was important. What things could be done to complete the challenge without making something that was just a hurry-up-and-get-this-done sort of effort.

Everything placed via the 'eyeball' method....

Could I/Should I sew together a string challenge without any strings included whatsoever? Hmm.. While I loved the idea of using the bolder fabrics for the main part of the tulips, it didn't quite right to say that the main theme of the prompt was completely unnecessary. How lame would that be? So I took a bunch of the leftover bits and at least made the centers of the tulips out of strings. Ahh.. that feels much better.

Moody colors

Frankly, the secondary challenge--the one where I determined to play with a slightly uncomfortable mixture of colors?--was where all the difficulties stemmed from. If I would have just went to the scrap bin originally and started out from that specific place, then the design decisions probably wouldn't have been such a headache. As it was, I was a little too boxed in. Surprise, surprise, the color palette started falling apart almost immediately!

The very first thing I did was throw out all of the funky greens that looked so good in the marinating stack. {I know, you probably never even saw them.} Yuck. They were positively hideous in the improv. units! Then I arranged and rearranged, over and over, the outside units until they stopped making my eyes cross. Well, I'm not sure they ever did. There was just something about the color blend that didn't sit right with me until I finally got the centerpiece sorted out. So basically I ended up working backwards. And that's the real story of why those tulips ended up being less string pieced and more of a one-piece fabric look.

Not quite what I was expecting

Notice how I finally settled on two rows all around with primarily blue backgrounds and then one more surround with the converse?  It's a subtle medallion look, which of course I love, but more importantly, it somehow suckers you into staring at the centerpiece again. Over the course of my very distracted, much-too-interrupted ponderings, I eventually realized where the drama had be. Uh huh, those tulips, where I could have so easily taken the cheater, cheater, pumpkin eater route. They aren't my most amazing tulips ever, but somehow the combination of busy, bold fabric prints, the look at me flowy lines, a little bit of mellow, utility looking string centers, and then.... the bullseye center at the midpoint of the orange {so weird, I know!} stems? Yep! It all works to say something good. So yeah, overall, I'm fairly satisfied with the results from this prompt. I didn't go so very far off script that it feels ridiculous. Bonus! I got to use up quite a few oddball fabrics that have been languishing forever in the bottoms of the totes. AND.... I didn't let this color palette completely throw me. Truly, it almost did.  

Playing with a woodworkers compass

In other quilty news, I have been experimenting with a large woodworking compass. It's a cheaply made ball bearing one that allows me to attach a fabric marking pen. It's supposed to stretch out to something like 48" or so, but I quickly found out that the farther you spread the compass arms, the harder it is to get good consistent lines.

Burned through 2+ quilt markers

My husband tried to give me some very good tips, but alas, I was not in the mood to listen. Just wanted to do my thing and who cares if the lines aren't precisely spaced around the initial circle? He finally went to bed early out of sheer frustration and I might have felt a little sorry for him.

Loving the results...

The fact is, I'm pretty happy getting a lovely radiating effect {lines approximately 2" apart}, and didn't want to spend any excess time getting everything absolutely perfect. In fact, perfection would have quite possibly ruined the look for me. Am I just being contrary? It feel like part of what I've focused in on for the past 10 years or so is the ability to convey a special look that most definitely features 'the human touch'. Not sloppiness or ignorance as to method, but one that feels more organic and genuine than absolute mastery of technique . I'm sure there are better compasses available, but wowsers, I'm having fun watching these flawed quilting lines transform the quilt! 

It Doesn't Feel Like Much

Got a busy weekend ahead so I wanted to throw some progress pics at you before things spiral out of control. It doesn't feel like much, but every bit of prep is another step forward! First up is the HST Medallion quilt, all quilted, first phase of binding sewn on and ready for the hand work. Woohoo! I didn't get it out of the hoop by the end of February like I hoped, but let me tell you, my fingers were burning up trying to finish things up!

HST Medallion ready for binding stitching

Next up in the hoop is the Scrapbin Improv. quilt, otherwise known as Wing and a Prayer. It's exactly what the name implies, a lot of scrappy scraps coming together in an earnest appeal for it to mesh and look right.

Wing and a Prayer

It most definitely appeals to me! And it's exactly what I need in the hoop right now. Having so much fun stitching on this quilt after the monstrosity that took up the past six weeks or so!

Loving having this one in the hoop!

Once I put my mind to it, the last border of Rhi's dress quilt came together relatively quickly. Simple, minimal and understated was what I was thinking, and of course, using up as much of the sunflower fabric as possible. 

The last border

I tried to add in several other small cut-off bits of the floral fabric, but it just made things look really busy. The bright floral yellow on the bottom was extremely hard to cut into. Been saving that for something special for a very long time. Then I thought, if my daughters quilt isn't special, what is? I am loving the black and white drawing-like motifs in this sunflower fabric though. Isn't it gorgeous? There's just something about it that melts me!

Such a good idea to rescue this fabric!

The backing is already cut out and sewn together for when I'm ready to sandwich the quilt. Probably gonna happen sometime in May? Have to take a short break first and focus on some other finishes though! These Melon Patch petals {below} have been sewn into four rows now, all ready for the next phase of the quilt. This quilt just keeps changing its mind about what it wants and now I'm leaning quite heavily towards making it a wordy quilt, intermixed between the petal rows. Been looking at available fabrics and pondering deep thoughts. So ready to move this quilt off the current UFO list, but ahem! So many appliqued pieces, it's somehow morphed into three quilts by now. I know. All will be explained in due time....

Figured out that I only need 4 borders, not 5!!

So easy to get going on the applique prep for 4-block Tulip Medallion. I've only been thinking about it for years! This quilt is starting to feel like an old and very comfy friend. Everything that I do to it just settles in like it was always meant to be. Wish they were all that easy, but then I suppose things would get terribly boring!

Getting these borders ready for the flowers

And then there is the squirrel quilt. I don't know what there is about this particular quilt, but I just can't seem to stay away. It's not even the right colors for the season, nothing springy about this on at all!

How bout some more tulips?

I've played with some quick drawings and doodles for potential ideas for this one, and occasionally I've even drew in a bit of applique. I mean, we're talking about me and my specific brain waves. Applique might possibly be part of how I'm hardwired? Anyway, always, without fail, I toss those ideas and go back to the idea of a medallion quilt in increasingly larger sizes of hst units. NO APPLIQUE. And then this happened. Seriously. Do I look like I need more applique projects waiting on me right about now?

Staying Focused

It feels so good to check a couple more projects off of the open-ended projects list. Gives me just a little bit of breathing room for the brand new starts. 'Cuz there's always gonna be new projects here, there and maybe every where!

Once again, it's a finish!

It was a relatively quick finish for the Ormes Inspired quilt once I put my mind to it. Just had to grit my teeth and plow through the last little bit of hand work on the batik fabric lettering. After that, there was a very small amount of effort to sew the block back into the border. Once that was done, then it was super simple to sew the white tulip over the top of the 'I' and wallah! the whole thing was back to being a true blue finish. I am so much happier with the final result now,  than ever before. Love how the appliqued word makes it feel more special.

AHIQHourglass/Tulip quilt

The AHIQHourglass challenge quilt/#3 in the tulip series quilt top is finished up too. I am so amazed and happy with the overall vibe to this quilt! All the hourglass units were sewed together in sets of four and then chopped off willy nilly at the ends. This makes for less-than-perfect economy block {look} cornerstones at the sashing, but I don't see that detracting from this utility style, improv. quilt at all.

The full quilt

Using the raspberry pink background fabric really amped up the cozy, almost romantic look and feel to this quilt. That was a bit unexpected, but so much fun to just 'roll' with! As always, I tried to push with certain fabric combinations, trying for blendy prints as well as throwing in a few larger print fabrics too. My default ever seems to be for using 'safe' fabric combo's and I've tried and tried and tried to break that habit throughout the years. Quilts tend to have a much more interesting feel when the fabric group as a whole takes on a personality! When all the prints are exactly the same scale, then the vibe tends toward boring. At least in my opinion. You're welcome to feel differently! 

All the leaves are blue in better lighting....

This same scale thing is sometimes a very good idea in certain areas of a quilt. You can't deny that some places will benefit greatly from this application! It helps give off a uniformity of spirit that seems a bit more peppy than simply using 4 yards of the same exact fabric and of course, enables all of us 'use-up-the-stash' lovers to really excel. 

In this quilt, I used very similar prints for the sashing {with both the creams and the gray-browns}, thus giving more room to push on the value in the gray-browns. Would it have looked fine with all the gray-browns being the same exact value? I think so, but mixing them up helps {subtly} to bring energy and movement to the quilt. If there would have been larger contrast used in the scale of the sashing prints, then there would have been less movement throughout, and undoubtedly, a  much choppier look.

For the eye popping 'look at me' prints {go ahead, pretend with me here!}, I definitely focused in on the tulip shapes and the stems. With the stems, it was easy. The same fabric is on repeat for every single block, but feels more engaging than one solid or blendy-type fabric combined with this particular background. If they become a little less noteworthy and more mundane due to repeats, meh. You probably like more chaotic looking quilts than I prefer! 

In a quilt like this, every single tulip could have been a busy, cool looking print. Alas, that's not my quilt stash. So, then it's time to make-do. Basically, I just play with a stack of fabrics, trying to mix and match interesting prints with change-ups in the color and value of blander looking fabrics until I get to 20 magic fabric pairings--the number of blocks needed here. If I have to toss out fabrics here and there, then that's exactly what happens. 

It's pretty obvious what I did for the leaves, mixing up both the color value and the print scale. In every quilt, there are decisions that inform the next move or phase of a quilt. With scrappy quilts, most of us are never quite sure what we intend to do until we are actually doing it. Experience makes it far easier to find the right opportunities to change up scale or value or when it's probably best to rely on a similar look/feel fabric mixture.

This one might be hard to get rid of some day!

It was difficult to feel comfortable using the med. pink for the tulips, but in the end, I really had no choice. What is contrast really, but what you make it to be? They couldn't all be red, white or black, either and the lighter pink had to go somewhere! Plus, I adored the sassy sweetness of adding slightly lighter pink over the darker pink. After all the applique was stitched,  I even threw out one fairly interesting printed white fabric tulip and substituted one more pink fabric tulip. Just because. 

Did you notice the orange tulip clear up in the far left corner of the quilt? I like how it ties back in with the larger print pink and orange floral fabric down towards the bottom of the quilt. Sometimes it pays to echo a cuckoo color in some other area of the quilt and since I wanted to use that scrap of larger floral? Super easy decision even though a part of me, that left brain, 'don't be a crazy' side, wanted to scrap it all. When I say that it was easy, that's because experience has taught me the importance of taking these sorts of chance in order to make a true 'me' quilt. You would take an entirely different risk and achieve a much better outcome--for you!

Always have to add something that
fades into the background!

So yeah. Blah, blah, blah, blah. This is me telling you why I love and adore this particular quilt. Yes, it was an impulse make. Yes, I was trying to use up the hourglass units. The thing is, successful scrappy don't generally happen entirely by accident. I don't care what people tell you, throwing a big pile of fabric in a bag and grabbing whichever pops up next, rarely works out wonderfully! 

Loving this quilt!

In most cases, there needs to be a measure of controls set into place. The when, where and how? That is entirely up to you and YOUR vision. Try to make your color palette, print scale and values WORK, but don't work exceedingly hard making it happen. Does that make any sense? Have a little fun and take chances and gradually {so gradually you might not even notice at first},  you'll be going with whatever flow the quilt quite organically generates. 

Do you think I wasn't the teensiest bit concerned about sewing all the leaves in blue? My mantra through the years has basically distilled into this one pragmatic thought: If a set of fabrics look good together in a stack, then they'll look great together in a quilt. Just pick a spot for each color and make it happen! As you struggle through the process time and again, you'll naturally get better at sorting out the proportions and pesky {but quite specific} details that take it to the next level. 

Rhi's quilt

Okay, time to get off my soapbox. After last weeks improv. adventure, it seemed like an excellent time to tackle the rest of my daughters dress quilt. Scrappy, improv. coins sounded fun and quite a good distraction from all the hand work currently filling up my evenings.  

No need to overthink it!

Though green is actually a challenging color for me to use as a predominant color in a quilt, it was the only way forward for the next round of this quilt. Try as I might, the blue fabrics {that I really, really wanted to use}, look completely uninterested in happily responding. Too much black and white bumped the quilt up to formal looking, instead of 'charming' {not a suitable look for those sunflowers} and yellow made the celery green center look like puce. I was doomed. Green it was! Next round will bring the quilt up to a good lap quilt size and feature more of the large floral. Trying like mad to keep this one as uncomplicated as the quilt will allow!

Moving Love Apples To the Finished Quilt Top Drawers

So Love Apples is a finished quilt top now! It was a bit difficult to photograph because the peachy pinks keep reflecting back a dingy vibe that isn't nearly as apparent in person. Overall, I'm quite relieved and happy to see this one come about as well as it did. This is a block that I always thought should have another go-round after I finished with my first effort back in 2015. Just took awhile to get back to the idea!

Love Apples is a finished quilt top!

This time around I made the love apples a little fatter with squat little stems. Such a fun, antique-look block to stitch on, you really should try your own variation some day! If you plan of doing any hand quilting at the end of the project, I recommend cutting out the excess fabric on the back of each layer. Will makes stitching much, much easier later on.

It wasn't very fun pinning and sewing all the long rows together, but it definitely wasn't hard to do. I love that this quilt was started from the remnants of a previous border attempt. One that failed spectacularly, but also one that tugged on my heartstrings and begged for yet another chance.

A little bit retro looking perhaps?

The fabrics all came together from a marinating stack that somehow had just never clicked into place. Keeping to the original challenge of using up the improv. peachy pink strips proved to be a struggle at times. Often, I pondered simply kicking those pieces out and doing something completely different, but why? They were the point of the entire exercise! 

Happy vibes...

There are several stacks of fabric sitting about in my quilt room with various amounts of old yellow fabrics included. I have lots and lots of yellow and it's not something that I tend to use oodles of, though apparently I tend to buy and/or acquire? So... this was also a great project to see some of them find a good home. I like that.

Always fun to work with a new
color palette!

My energy has felt very low ebb in the last couple weeks so it's been easy to wander in and out of the quilt room and ignore all the lists. I pick up a project here, set one down and just generally gain very little ground on anything. So imagine my surprise when I found myself starting a brand new project?

Starting a brand new project!

Yah. Not sure how that happens, but I'm not gonna hide it away like a guilty secret. Around Christmas one of my daughters approached me about making a quilt with one of her old Summer dresses. It's a lovely, lovely floral fabric that really could/should shine in a quilt, but honestly, I'm feeling a bit inadequate for the task these days.

The first thing I did was gather a group of fabrics together and then I just sort of eyeballed them once in awhile when I passed through the quilt room. Hmm... Eventually I did a quick pass through Pinterest and subconsciously gathered ideas for quilts with large pieces of intact fabric. Oh, did I mention that we'd like to keep the floral pieces as large and uncut as possible? A couple rough sketches and finally one day I found myself trying to get started on the centerpiece. I ended up hand stitching the blue striped fabric over the top of the other fabrics, just so the floral didn't get cut into any more than necessary. There's still one more large piece of that floral left and several smaller strips. We'll see where the quilt goes from here, but I'm leaning hard towards a border of improv. strippy coins. Can't hardly go wrong with that, right? Thankfully I have 100% design control other than the 'keep the florals large please!'