Monday, October 12, 2009

With apologies for lateness...

Yesterday, I finally completed September's Snip.Sew.Send. block. Sufficit to say, I'm late. I have already sent some profuse apologies to the ever-gracious Lisa, and I should have her block in the mail to her on the morrow. Yay!

Lisa sent a variety of fabrics: red, blue, and green batiks, red and white prints, and some solid white. She loves scrappy quilts, and her fabrics really reflected an eclectic and fun style. Her block requirements: include each of the different fabrics in the 10.5" block, and include at least one star.

Sounds simple, right? Sigh... not for me. I felt overwhelmed by the array of fabrics and I just couldn't envision anything that seemed "right." But then one day, I ran across a post in Kathy Mack's Pink Chalk Studio blog that inspired me. She had recently made a wonky, free-form star block called "Maverick Star" AND she included some links to tutorials on how to do it. Perfect!

I used the Quiltville tutorial for "Maverick Stars!!!" and followed it pretty much to the letter, except that I used 2" squares instead of 2.5" (because I wanted smaller stars). It worked great. But then I kind of got stuck. I didn't have enough of the blue or green fabrics to make more stars, nor did I have enough of them to fill-in the surrounding areas (though that is what I had hoped to do). But I did have lots of red. So, I put red four-patches in the corners.


I think the result is kind of festive-looking in a crazy, scrappy kind of way. And I like the vibrancy of the red four-patches. I also like that I was able to push myself out of my comfort zone to make this. It is maybe not aesthetically perfect (at least, not to my mind), but I think it has a certain charm to it. Hopefully, Lisa will think so too.

7 comments:

Roslyn said...

I like the title maverick Stars!
I'm sure the recipient will love it.

Lisa A. said...

This is such a great block! I love all the red and white bits in the stars. I knew all that fabric would freak some people out, but you definitely rose to the occasion. Totally worth the wait. Thank you so much!

Live a Colorful Life said...

This is really cute and I do love maverick stars. Kathy at Pink Chalk is amazing. Great tutorials and super fast service if you need something in a hurry.

Back to the topic. This is going to
be a great quilt.

Also, thanks for leaving kind comments about my Quilt Festival quilt.

Kris said...

This is great! Way to push yourself out of your comfort zone!

Anne at Film and Thread said...

Great job! Don't you love how each month has a different challenge to learn?

Hermione J. Schwartz said...

Love the Maverick Stars! I like the little kick to the side they have. Your block looks great and you did a wonderful job of pulling in all those fabrics. =]

Jeanne said...

This is a great block. I happened upon this site and I totally want to get involved in a virtual quilting bee! I've googled a lot and read lots about them, but don't know exactly how to go about getting involved in a new one starting up. Any ideas???