Pinktober, the Sequel

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I was so excited to receive my newest Spoonflower cheater quilt panels. It was difficult to decide which one I should use for the new baby quilt, and I ultimately chose the original. I used some stash batik and some pink Grunge for the border, and the top was done in just a couple of hours.

The second panel is similar to the first but square instead of horizontal. The second two panels are going to be so fun to work into quilts once I finish the baby quilt. Then I'd have a couple of pink quilts ready if another little baby girl comes along...

In the meantime, I have to finish the quilt back. I began with 36 pink charm squares from the temperature quilt stash I was hoping to make into a real temperature quilt in 2023. I'm not so sure I will make an actual fabric temperature quilt now, so I didn't mind robbing the stash. But then I realized the 6x6 stitched block wasn't near big enough for the already finished quilt top.

So I dug into my pink scraps stash and added one more row of pink charm squares, then cut some 2.5-inch patches for an inner border. I really like the new size and the improved design, but now I'm stuck! I can't decide what to do next, and it needs to be more than ten inches wider and longer. I want to use fabrics in my pink stash, and I have pink charm squares, my own 2.5-inch strips and even a few layer cake squares. Ir, I could dig into some pink stash yardage and make a solid border, which I'm actually considering. I just have come up with something I think will look pretty not too busy.

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Heating Up

I've finished the next segment of my digital snowflake temperature quilt, and I sent it off to Spoonflower. Got the yardage in the mail yesterday, and man, oh, man, I can't wait to create!!!

(affiliate links to my designs)

I've done four segments so far this year. The colors are really changing now as we warm up. I changed the way I was creating each snowflake block after the first two segments, and I think the new method looks better up close in print on fabric.

The old way has depth thanks to snowflake shadows, but the new way has whiter flakes, which I just have not able to achieve consistently the old way, even with heavy photoshopping of my Spoonflower images.

Now I kind of want to go back and do January and February of 2023 over the new way, but I don't have time for that right now, especially if I want to start sewing and quilting again.

Another new thing I've done for the last two months was to create a smaller version of each snowflake temperature quilt segment. I think these fat quarters would be fun to assemble into a quilt of the whole year's segments when complete. Otherwise, they would make adorable doll quilts, I think.

I really had fun photographing the cheater panels with real crocheted snowflakes to demonstrate the element of size.

I've also finished the second segment of my digital temperature quilt mockup I created to sample the colors I've set aside for a charm square temperature quilt next year. I started organizing my scraps that are big enough to cut into charms and my leftover charms in December of 2022, and I was really excited to begin my first genuine fabric temperature quilt in January of this year. I decided at the very last minute, on January 1, however, to cool my heels and wait so I could audition the color scheme digitally first. I wanted to make sure I like the project enough to keep going all year.

I LOVE the first segment, with its predominantly cool hues of the rainbow, similar to what I'm using in my 2023 crochet temperature project. The second segment is okay, to me, but not nearly as attractive as the first segment.

But now, the third segment I began the first week of May is making me have second thoughts about my proposed charm square color scheme.

I have to keep reminding myself how much I love last year's digital snowflake temperature quilt.

It has a similar temperature scale, just fewer warm colors.

My original fabric temperature quilt plan was to use up scraps and charms I probably won't use in any other project, particularly the reds, yellows and oranges. I'm going to press on with my digital mockup and hopefully convince myself that working with colors I don't enjoy as much will be visually rewarding in the end, as well as finally make a significant dent in my scraps.

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Think Green

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Wordless Wednesday

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