Sometimes, I surprise myself. For a project that I didn't think I would ever be able to sustain and finish, I am making surprisingly good progress on the Grandmother's Flower Garden quilt. And wait until I tell you what I did these past few days which forced me to stay on task with this.
The paths are attached on over half - almost 3/4ths - of the flowers. Every bit of path shown in this photo is attached to a flower on most sides. In that upper right corner are the remaining unattached flowers.
The unattached flowers are shown more fully in this photo. I've sort of approximated their placement, but of course, it will all change and be rearranged before finishing. I still need to make about 13 more flowers, too, so randomly setting all the colors will factor into the placement.
Instead of calling this quilt Grandmother's Flower Garden, I may have to subtitle it Anna Karenina's Garden. Yes, my audio book has been the 34-hour long Tolstoy classic, Anna Karenina. The book consists of 239 chapters in 864 pages. Yikes!
Whatever possessed me?!!? I'll tell you. As a retired English teacher of over 40 years, I have never read any great Russian author. I decided that listening to one of these long, long tomes would be worthwhile for stitching.
Ha! The joke's on me! I really didn't like it much. I appreciate Tolstoy's immense ability to observe and relay human nature in all facets of life and in all manner of situations, but in the end, I want a worthy protagonist. You don't get that in AK. Nope. Every character is shown both in good and bad light, and readers must form their own opinions of right and wrong. Critics call AK one of the most perfect novels ever written, but it will take quite a lot of convincing for me to agree on that. The ending was largely Tolstoy (through the character of Levin) outlining his ongoing deep, inner philosophical struggles with his inability to be a good and worthy human in all things, in his marriage, in fatherhood, in society, in faith.
I did finish it (audio form), I can check it off my list of things to accomplish, but I'm not delving any further into Russian literature any time soon.
If you stayed with me through that lengthy synopsis, then you deserve one more look at my flower garden. Future audio books associated with this quilt will be more entertaining, for sure. *grin*
Hope you are having a wonderful Monday! We awoke to quite a thunder storm this morning, but the afternoon is looking brighter.
Happy Quilting, Friends!
Jayne
Flower Garden is beautiful! It's always nice to cross something off the bucket list and you did that with AK!
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