Funny How Things Change

So I wanted to talk a little about the quilt retreat I went to yesterday. 

I forgot to show you this photograph yesterday, when we looked at the fabric I cut out for the retreat.  Both of these fabrics were candidates for the center portion of the Courthouse Steps blocks.  The taupe with lines on it was my first choice.  It was also designed by Carrie Bloomston, who did the Paint collection I was using.

But the night before the retreat I decided it was too boring, so I cut out the Simplicity text print instead.

Fast forward to Retreat Day, and before I did any stitching at all, I asked my friend which one she thought worked better.  (I cleverly had brought the "reject" along with me.)  She immediately picked the taupe with the lines, and she didn't refer to it as boring at all.  It took me a millisecond to change my mind, so I borrowed her 6" x 24" ruler and ran off to the cutting table.

That was Change Number One.

 

I pieced the Courthouse Steps at the retreat, and this morning I threw all of the blocks, including the 10" squares, on my design wall.  Do you remember in yesterday's post how my fabric selection included paint, sewing, and gardening themes?  Yeah, well maybe that's a bit much.  This is a corner of the 25-block quilt.  I didn't like it at all.  

When I pulled and cut the fabric, I thought it would be OK because the colors worked together.  But, egads, those great big 10" squares of dress forms (row 1), sewing logos (row 2) and knock-your-eyes-out flowers (row 3) made me feel unsettled.

Ugh, now what? I wondered.

I dug around for my leftover Paint collection, and had enough to cut 10" blocks to replace the sewing and gardening blocks.  Better, right?

However, I left that sewing and gardening fabric in the Courthouse Steps borders, because 
1)  in little bits it looked OK
2)  my leftover Paint collection only yielded enough to squeak out the extra 10" blocks, and 
3)  did you really think I'd want to rip out all that stitching?

This is going to be Change Number Two (I still need to trim the leftover Paint fabric down to 10".)

Just out of curiosity, I slapped the Simplicity squares I had already cut out, over the taupe centers.  Kind of cute, but the Paint fabric isn't the star - Simplicity is drawing my eye.

So this is the winner, and instead of thinking of that taupe center fabric as boring, I'll think of it as paint strokes.

I've started lots of projects this month, but now I'm going to stick with this one until it's done.