April projects

I have a bunch of monthly projects that need to stay current, and the only one I've worked on so far in April is Jan Patek's 2009 mystery quilt. So the last two days I spent making blocks for my North Star Quilters $1 BOM. (You can see the posts I've done about this quilt by clicking here.)

When I first started I pulled all the fabrics from a collection I bought several years ago - Poetry by April Cornell for Moda. I still love these pastel fabrics - and fabrics like this have almost disappeared from my stash. Wonderful pastels like this just shout "Spring!" to me, and we needed a spring quilt for our bed. So these were a natural choice to use for this BOM.

I added only a very few additional fabrics when I made the first two blocks - and immediately realized I needed more mediums as well as some darks for "punch". So I added at least another 20-25 fabrics before I made the March blocks. I wasn't that happy with the March blocks either, so before I made April's I added a bunch more fabrics (see all the real oldies I added? Hopefully I can use up some of these!) I think I have a great selection now - except I need more blues. I have lots of blues in my stash, but not that many light blues, and most of the ones I have have a greyed look to them because they are from that "mauve and greyed blue period" that occurred in the very late 70's and early 80's. Hmmm . . . maybe I still need to shop a little?

I really like this month's block - pinwheels - so I made three. I love how they turned out. The last picture shows all the blocks together. I need to work on some of these a bit more - the dark triangles in the top left block just take over - I need to switch them to a medium fabric. And a couple of the blocks are a bit too light with no contrast - I need to fix those also. Not sure if I'll remake these or just make new ones and put the others into the orphan bin.

I'm having so much fun with this quilt!

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Gratitudes:

1. Spring has arrived, along with marvelous spring flowers everywhere. I especially love the blue grape hyacinths and yellow daffodils together.

2. Our daughter continues to improve

3. More time these days for quilting

4. Fiber 1 bars!

What I've been up to

I took a couple days at the end of last week to prewash some fabric, iron it, and put it away. I didn't do it all, but I needed to do what I wanted to use. I went on a buying spree in February to stock up on light colored plaids. I needed larger pieces than I had for background blocks for a few different applique projects. Joseph went along as it was a Joseph day, and he was very happy to help pick my fabrics. First he chose a couple fat quarters, which I put back after explaining that I needed bigger pieces. I pulled a few bolts and took them to the counter - whereupon he pulled a bolt or two also. It was so much fun watching him ooh and aah over the pretty fabrics LOL!

Yesterday I pulled a bunch more fabrics to use in our North Star Quilters BOM. As I made my first block last month I realized I needed a bunch more mediums and darks in order to make the best fabric choices for the blocks. Once I was satisfied with my selection I made another February block and two of the March blocks. I'm really happy with how they turned out.

Today I was back to prepping applique - this time the center of Jo Morton's Little Women's medallion quilt. I'm determined to have the first three parts finished by the time we have the next club meeting next month. Tomorrow I should finish the center block and will post a picture. I'm using a new applique method that I learned in the first meeting - I like it! I'll try to get a tutorial up about that also.