A Peachy Surprise!

Sometimes, from the depths of the quilting room, surprises emerge. Yes. I am a bonafide recipient of such a surprise, and it is wreaking havoc with my goals for this month, as I am working on it as opposed to the carefully considered list I had intended.

So, about a week ago, I uncovered a stack of 4-patch blocks that I absolutely could not remember making. I recognized the fabric, but why? When? It completely mystified me. Bit by bit, a glimmer of recollection formed, and I am pretty sure I remember doing them. I cut one 2.5-inch strip from a large (yardage-wise) peach fabric and one from a creamy neutral. I was testing the stitching on the Featherweight I had just bought, and needed some simple stitching. These 4-patches were that simple stitching.

I then moved on to a near-year's worth of other things, and these little darlings were buried under all manner of sewing room debris. Yes, I will say debris. I do tend to collect "stuff" in this space.

And then, in a fit of tidying up, SURPRISE!! I found them. Loved them! Wanted to do something with them! But what? My first thought was to just make a big ol' quilt top with these and an alternate block - maybe an hourglass. That would require finding 2 complimenting fabrics.

This takes me to Monday, when I trekked to Columbus to meet two dear friends for lunch and shopping at Red Rooster. Dee and Sharon and I go back to our early teaching days at CHS. While we are now all retired, we still find a way to stay connected and we meet a couple of times a year when possible. Click here to see a similar day we shared in 2018. In the back of my mind, I planned to search for two fabrics to coordinate with my little peachy 4-patches.

But I forgot to take the 4-patches with me, so I had to "match" them with only my mental recollection of the color. Hmmm...not good. I have never been overly successful with this sort of thing.

Undeterred, I pulled two bolts off the clearance shelves. These two look good together, and with a whim and a prayer, I hoped they would also work with my little 4-patches. I carried them around awhile, thinking about them, wondering if they'd be okay, doubting that I could so easily find what I wanted. After all my careful considerations, I took the plunge and bought 2 yards of each.

Woo-hoooo! The thrill of victory is a thing, people!! I mean it! This has worked out better than I ever imagined it would! I can totally make this work, so I made a few hourglass blocks and proceeded to play around with options.

Totally sticking with my original plan, I laid the two sets of blocks out alternately, as shown above. Looks good. I can see that secondary design forming of the orange chains which would span diagonally across the quilt. Nice.

I played around a little further, and made a more square layout hoping to see  more of the diagonal design. Instead, what I see looks like a candy wrapper or a 'popper' that you twist open for a surprise.

I then tried changing the orientation of the hourglass blocks. Oh my goodness! A star is born!

No doubt, this is what I want. I do intend to change out that outer part of the hourglass block from the medium print to the background neutral. And that is what I spent Wednesday working on.

I am now on my way to a quilt top that was entirely unplanned, but oh well. I have so enjoyed this creative process. The way the top evolved illustrates the way so many of my mental pictures turn into fabric reality. Rarely is there a straight line from beginning to end; more often, many twists, turns, tangents and - sometimes - troubles fuel me on my way.

If all the blocks are places side-by-side, then an interesting 16-patch design forms where the 4 corners meet. Nice. However, look at the next pic. If I use the neutral as sashing, the 4-patch in the cornerstones, the stars take a more predominant role, and the diagonal line shows nicely.

So far, I have just these 4 star blocks made. I think I will make at least 8 more. I do think I am going to use the sashing between the blocks, provided I have enough neutral on hand. If I decide I want a bigger quilt, and if I have sufficient fabrics to continue, I might make more stars. It's a work in progress, for sure.