First and foremost, a congrats to Laurel, the winner of our Sew Fresh Fabrics solid charm pack giveaway. Random.org decided that she was lucky number 36!
I’ve been hard at work on my stack of flimsies this past week. Two are quilted, one is completely bound, and the other is part of the way there.
But I needed a break from the hand-sewing and wasn’t mentally or physically ready to crawl on the floor and baste the third, so I jumped right in and started piecing together my half-square triangle blocks.
Due to the joy of chain-piecing (seriously, I have a problem, I almost refuse to make something if I can’t chain-piece it), five blocks came together in no time. It goes even faster when you realize that the block is totally symmetrical, so you can make two outer rows and two inner rows kind of at the same time. Anyways, what I’m saying is, it goes fast.
With my 4.5″ (unfinished) squares, these blocks end up at a generous 16.5″ square. It’s nice to have it work up so big, and so fast, since the HSTs themselves took so darn long. Of course, five blocks (I plan on 20, plus some borders) only used up 80 of my 400+ squares, so I still have a ways to go.
This level of scrappiness requires something a big leap of faith for me. I didn’t weed out any fabrics, I didn’t go into it with a particular color scheme. It’s just… everything. So, as I start to put the blocks together, there are some downright weird fabric pairings going up next to each other. I don’t look at a completed block and fall in love. But the magic of a scrappy quilt is when you see the finished product as a whole. Somehow the complete randomness (with some nice white space to break it up) ends up working a crazy kind of fabric alchemy and looking good when it’s all put together.
Or, so I’m telling myself.
In the meantime, I’m trying to put these blocks together with as little thought as possible. Just grabbing one after the other out of the box of random-y random goodness, reserving the veto only for when two near-identical colors try to get next to each other. I will likely do the same when I put the rows and the top together, and not just because I don’t have the space to lay them all out ahead of time. I’m trying to really let random be random.
Let’s hope it all works out, in the end.
Wow I am so excited to be the Random number pickers pick! Love your beautiful triangle madness square and think the randomness will work out wonderfully!
Laurel Johnson recently posted..Thursday Update
Yay for randomness! Just wanted to ask about Kona Bone – is it a lot darker than Snow?
It will work out beautifully — there is something amazing about scrap quilts that way, somehow it all comes out right in the end.
Oh yes, that is the magic of scrap quilts! There’s always a point in the middle (or, pretty much the entire time you’re making the quilt) that you’re thinking, “I should quit, this is going to look TERRIBLE,” and then you finish it (and wash it so it’s all scrumply) and it looks FANTASTIC. And you’re so glad you didn’t quit when you thought the project was a lost cause.
So hang in there!
As for me, I’m still cutting out the squares for my HST’s, which (because I have poor judgement) have shrunk and are now going to finish at 2″. Hee hee. I’ll get there eventually!
~Angela~
Angela (Cottage Magpie) recently posted..Stash Storage
Yeah, this will be very nice in the end. My top was ready, or almost ready,(needs some edges around before quilting) a couple of days ago. You’ll find it at the Flickr group. I decided to put it about the same way as you, just turned the corner triangles. Now I still sew triangles nearly every day. Think it will be another one in a while. Have to use up parts of my stash….
tubakk recently posted..Give-away
OOh! I’m loving this! I cant wait to join you! I have a bin full of about 300 HST’s and it looks like I’m gonna do a similar scrappy pattern….but….I HAVE to finish up a couple of things first, so…. I’ll meet ya in a week or two. Happy, scrappy blocking! Best.
Susan McKey recently posted..newness
Random is always hard for me … I’m just a planner at heart
Your blocks look fabulous. Can’t wait to see the finished quilt! (and I bet you can’t either!)