Why Not? // 1

In August 2020 I started a new improvised hand sewing project to take with me while looking after my exhibit that took place a month later. I resorted to simple epp squares. My plan was to sew sixteenpatch blocks with a defined color palette and decide later what to do with them.

I had two bright orange prints I no longer liked and decided (why not?) to try using bleach to change the color. The result was a kind of apricot or salmon hue and I liked pairing them with brown/reddish ones.

After the exhibit this became a side project and by the end of 2020 I had sewn a decent number of blocks and found I wanted to add interest by introducing another pair of colors.

By April of this year I had hand sewn enough blocks to start thinking about layout on my design wall.

It was also then that I felt I didn't want to fill the blanks with more of the same blocks but rather (why not?) introduce another element.

That was also the moment I no longer wanted to continue hand sewing this top and decided (why not?) to continue by machine piecing the blocks together. 

Because I added sashing but not everywhere I had some fussy piecing to do.

Adding those small corner stones was a bit tedious but very worth the effort.

It became July when I got around to machine quilt and in August the binding was attached and funny enough in September, exactly a year after the exhibit that started this project, I attached the label.

It took me another while to take pictures of the finished quilt and to pull myself together to write this blogpost. Instagram makes sharing pictures so much easier and I've shown many there including the finished quilt last September. Still I wanted to document the journey of this making here too. Tomorrow I'll post the finished quilt as well.