Monday, February 6, 2012

A challenge or two, or maybe three

I could not bring myself to create another house today.  I tried to pull fabric, but they all so no.  I had ten things on my list to get done between last Friday and today, so I grabbed the list to see what I had left.  On it were three challenges.
Challlenge #1  Sarah at Confessions of a Fabric Addict put up a challenge to design a block any size using blocks no bigger than 5", 3.5" and 2", cut.  They could be smaller.  I love a puzzle, so I started with a 12" square design, and started filling the space with squares.  My drawing called for 4.5", 3.5", 2.5", and 1.5". 

Since one of my goals this year is to conquer the Y seam, I paid no attention to how it all laid out.  In the end, I ended up with two Y seams, and I pulled them off without a hitch.  After the drawing, I had to pull fabric, which lead to
Challenge #2  At the November Rebels meeting, we each took a piece of this fabric and are to return with a project using it in February.

I started out really not liking this fabric.  Then I decided the colors were okay if I only paid attention to them.  So, I pulled it out and started pulling other colors.  I decided not to focus on the reds and blues, but on the golds, pinks, deep purples and mauves.

When I was pulling the pink hand dyed, I remembered the small Madonna from Victoria, and knew I had to use it.  It violates the rules about squares in the first challenge, but maybe I can sqeak it by.  I also pulled a couple of scraps from the Mexican Star quilt and another batik I thought would work well.  I seem to be in a very warm color mood these days.  I know there is a fancy name for this color combination besides complimentary, but it escapes me at the moment.  It is one I like.
Here are a couple of detail shots.


I decided I could use some vignettes of the challenge fabric, as long as I kept them small.
Challenge #3 The colors for the Patchwork Times February color challenge have been posted.
I have them up on the wall, and I noticed that today's puzzle project was very near the right colors for the left half of the bar.  If I want to add lime green strips and borders, I will have completed challenge #3.  Hmmm.
All in all, I got 6 1/2 things out of the ten done.  I usually over-estimate much worse than that.
I will be with Bella the next three days, so you probably won't hear from me before Friday.
Until then, joyful quilting everyone.



6 comments:

Sarah Craig said...

Oh, Miki, what an awesome block! I love the way the colors work together. And I heard someone say once that if a fabric was still ugly, you just hadn't cut it small enough yet!

Eat Sleep Quilt said...

Wonderful job on the block design! That fabric would have challenged me too but I'd never have thought to un-focus on the red, it's so predominant. Isn't it great when you can do a twofer?

sheila 77 said...

Once again, beautiful work. I laughed when you said your fabrics didn't want to do a house. I think ten very original houses would exhaust any fabric. My fabrics do that sort of thing all the time. Have a nice few days with Bella.

Snoodles said...

Amazing what you did with the fabric you didn't like too much...I love to see your color choices.
I hope that I do not offend you, or that you would prefer to have an "award-free" blog, but I sincerely value your blog and enjoy it very much. I have nominated you for the "Versatile Blogger" award over at Lilypadquilting(dot)blogspot(dot)com. Thanks for being an inspiring part of my day!

Vroomans' Quilts said...

Now I liked that fabric, but can see how you drew from it with all the color play to design a very nice block - well done.

Anonymous said...

Great block & design! Thanks for entering your block in the challenge!