Saturday... and Back to Quilting

I got up Saturday morning and went straight to my sewing room.  I have missed being there, the last couple weeks being so hectic what with travel and jury duty.  I was inspired to revisit and assemble my Grinch Quilt. My last post on it was 2011/12. The filler blocks, made with a stack and whack technique were competing for attention with the Grinch panels and overwhelming them. I wanted the filler rectangles to look random and catawampus like Suess's illustrations but I think I went too far. Here are some of my stack and whack filler blocks.

After having been away from the quilt for 15 months, I took a fresh look and decided to scale back the overall size by narrowing the filler blocks. I chopped each into rough thirds. Here is the revised proposed layout where I sliced off each long edge of the filler block to use for vertical sashing and kept a wider middle section of each filler block to use as horizontal sashings. I will still use my leftover stack and whack rectangles to fill out the sides of the shorter rows.

I am going to let it sit overnight. It still seems a bit busy but it may grow on me.  With different colored blocks of different sizes I need something to unify it all without being too precise. Not only would the precision drive me crazy but the spirit would not be in keeping with the Suessical feel of things. Here are my leftover long edge strips pinned to the bulletin board next to my design wall.

I think I will put them around the assembled top as an outer sashing. Not randomly. I do not want two of the same fabrics to touch and I want to put darks by light blocks and light by dark blocks. I will probably end up placing each one and shifting it around about a half dozen times- just like the did the vertical and horizontal sashing dividers. I have a problem that I work too hard on randomness. Then again, handling and gazing at fabric is hardly work.

I took a break mid-day and went to the quilt show of my local guild. Here is what I had laid out before taking a break.  When I returned, the breeze had blown about half the strips off my design wall. Yikes! I had to start again.  I usually take a photo, too, but this time I had not. Oh, well. I like to think it will be better the second time around.

At the quilt show of my local guild there was a big display of the Quilts of Valor, quilts made by volunteers who then donate them to those who have served in our armed services.  There were lots of red/white/blue quilts.  I also admired the occasional smattering of beige/grey/camouflage quilts spiked with orange - probably for Desert Storm I guess. I made a point of noticing the quilting patterns on the various quilts as inspiration for my determination to better my FMQ and got some neat ideas for triangles and flying geese.  I was in awe of one pattern someone quilted. I am pretty sure that this particular pattern was done on a long arm but just look at the intricacy of this stitchery.

Here is the whole quilt it came from.

There were just a few vendors and I picked up these fabrics.  I indulged my weakness for polka dots with the top two fabrics and I might incorporate one of the bottom two white/red and white/black into accent strips of the Grinch.

I also bought a template set for Storm at Sea. I really love that pattern and yet struggle with aligning those non-45 degree angled blocks.  I made one batik quilt from a Fons and Porter kit once where the pieces had been previously laser die cut.  This is the last quilt shown at the bottom of my side bar at the right. Having the little corners nipped off really helped in the alignment so I am hoping this template is worth the investment. I have been wanting to make a variation of Storm at Sea that I saw on the wall in a Quilt store in Oklahoma last April when visiting my daughter. Here is that quilt. The picture is kind of blurry but I an sure you can get the idea.

Lastly I changed the look of my blog.  I had been using a blogger designer template where the background was a deep magenta and the text was white, the side bars a yellow and peach paisley design.  It was difficult to read.  I learned to play around with the customization and came up with this new color scheme. I hope this new fresh look is easier on the eyes.  I will stick with this for a while till I get bored with it and change again.

Completed projects:

1. Redesigned blog layout.

Ongoing projects:  

1. Grinch quilt (see 2011/12) - being assembled with smaller sashing options
2. Color Play of the Day (see 2013/01) - back from long arm quilter, ready for binding
3. Sunny Spring Frost - back from long arm quilter, ready for binding
4. Jack O'Lantern Trio (see 2013/02) - awaiting FMQ
5. Chicken quilt - awaiting FMQ
6. Overlapping square wall hanging - awaiting FMQ
7. Mask quilt (see 2011/10) - hidden away in a container awaiting inspiration for arranging hexagons
8. Scarecrow (see 2013/01) - just add his doo-dads and be done with him!
9. Paper pieced block of the month - downloaded and ready to print

New projects:  

1. None

Stats since last WIP:

     Completed  projects - 1

     New projects - 0

     Currently in progress - 9 

Now I am off to check out what the rest of you have been up to at:

http://www.freshlypieced.com/