not hand stitching

a new storm front moved in yesterday and we've had another 12" of snow blanket the countryside so i've been staying indoors as much as possible. at least whenever i'm not shoveling snow...

a month or so ago, i remember mentioning that i was going to play with strips and squares for a bit but i never really got around to it. i needed a little break from all the hand stitching i've been doing on community, so pulled out my old sewing machine and a basket of scraps from old quilt projects and started cutting and sewing.  i've ended up with a roughly 24" square comprised of 2" strips and 2" square sets in predominantly greens and browns...with a few other colors tossed in because, well, let's face it, they simply got in the way. ha!

i'm just sort of allowing this quilt to manifest in whatever manner it chooses. though i think, at this point, that i will alternate the orientation of the blocks so that i end up with a sort of a woven effect. but we will see what happens when i get a few more blocks done (i have 3 pieced together already, and strips/squares pulled together for another 13 or so). in the spirit of not hand stitching, i think i may end up machine quilting this one with cotton batting and a backing in a somewhat more traditional manner. sometimes, there is something to be said for instant gratification. ha!  though i don't think i'll take this over to laurel and rent a longarm machine. i want to try out a stylized technique of "quilt as you go"...only instead of quilting each block and then having all that endless hand stitching on the backing (remembering the spirit of not hand stitching), i'm going to assemble the blocks into rows and quilt them a row at a time. i think i have figured out a way to avoid hand stitching the back seams on the rows, as well!

more as i get a little further along...

namaste'