MODEST TILES-- basted and ready to be quilted

 I got this one ready a week ago, but have been slow to post, and slow to start the quilting.  

 I moved the furniture around and basted it in my living room.  It's pretty long, calling for my longest boards for pinning out.

I'm not sure what I want to do, hand-quilt, machine-quilt, or a combination of both.

Whatever I choose will really show up on those solid fabric rectangles/tiles, so I'm still thinking it over.

 This is another quilt based on a catalog/magazine cut-outs that I have saved in an "inspiration folder".

More photos to come, hopefully, when the quilt is finished !

I finished another quilt top ! Butterscotch and Stripes

EDIT:  

 Now bordered in the stripe.  Have enough left to bind it with same stripe.
And I want to note that I bought a used Q-Snap floor frame from Wanda C. (that's it overturned in the photo so that Marley doesn't use it as a hammock !)  Love it !

This top just came out of NOWHERE. 

A friend was placing an order with Connecting Threads a couple of months ago,and asked if I wanted to add something onto her order and share the postage.

I had been eyeing this green stripe, so I said, "yeh, get me 3 yards of this."

Well, at about the same time that it arrived, I spied this butterscotch-colored Waverly solid at our local Walmart.  I had meant to get some of it when several of their solids went to $1.00 per yard last summer, but I kept putting it off until I missed it.   Somehow this bolt missed the markdown and when I saw it, it only had 2 yards left on it !    So I bought the rest of the bolt.

I had NO PLAN to use the two fabrics together.  In fact, I was playing around with some other solids/polka dots and white-background prints, using this block. 

For some reason, (I think that I realized that I didn't have enough fabric like this to make anything of size), I switched and started making blocks with the butterscotch and my brown prints.  I tried a couple of layouts and really thought that the coloration looked RICH (still do!)

At first, I was laying the blocks out ON TOP OF the green striped fabric, to see how the combo worked.  I LIKED IT !

Then, after messing with design in EQ5, I changed to this 'trip around the world' shape.  I liked using the green stripe here, making it look recessed, and bringing the blocks forward.

Then at the end, I decided to use the rest of the butterscotch to give me big areas for quilting at the corners.

Based on 6-inch blocks, the finished size of the top right now is approximately 60 X 72 inches.  I don't know if I'll add borders to make it fit a bed or not.  Just letting it tell me what it needs, ya' know? Looking back at the first layout, I'm missing the big green feel.  Maybe I need to find a green that would work for a big outer border.

Quality control checked it out and gave it approval as is, but I'm still waiting for more input.

The color in the photos from different rooms really varies.  True color is somewhere inbetween.

Two New Endeavors

Recently I was approached to do a commission for someone......I gave the standard answer, that I rarely accept one, and that it has to be something that I really want to do, AND that I am expensive to hire.

But this turned out to be a little bit different case.   A friend  had gotten halfway finished on a quilt that she was making for a family member, and then she lost the ability to use her hands that way due to neuropathy which developed as a result of chemo treatments.  Okay, I'm in.  Her design called for minimal quilting paired with a puffy polyester batting (so pretty), so with her being so far along on it, I really didn't have much to do.  I finished it within a week, and she and I both felt blessed for the effort. 

Her handwork in cross-stitching the panel blocks is just beautiful.....some of the best that I have personally witnessed.

The project fell into my lap when I was between personal works, and I really didn't know what I wanted to make next.  So I spent the quilting time thinking on it.   I gave her this quilt on Tuesday, and spun my heels for another day and a half.

Then yesterday afternoon, I got out some charm packs that I have had for a good while, and I started playing with one in particular.  At first, I just threw a bunch of them up onto a background of dark solid brown, with no specific order to them.  Many of the squares were very floral.

Then, the more I studied them, the more I wanted to portray the idea of a tree, and grass, and bushes covered in pink blooms.   Late yesterday evening, after a dozen or so photo trials, I came up with a design that I was happy with, and I started piecing.  I finally had to make myself go to bed at 11:30 p.m.

As soon as I got the chance, I was back piecing again today, and I am happy with this finished work. 

It sortof has the look of peering through a window, or a lattice, or garden gate.  I could have pieced it to look more like attic windows, etc., to be more realistic; but I really didn't want that.  I wanted to keep it more abstract.   I can envision this hanging on the wall of my sewing room on dreary, gray Winter days, promising Springtime's burst of color.  Yep.....I like it.

I hope you like it too.  The charm pack's name is "Sultry", by Moda, and is well over 10 years old. Top finished around 39 inches square.