It's a Start

There's one more baby quilt in my project backlog.  After a lot of straight-line piecing, I felt the need for another curved pattern.  I had seen Flowering Snowball pop up in other quilters' blogs and decided to try it out.  It's one of those fun patterns that change depending on what you focus on.  I found a template and sized it down for a 9" finished block (so I could have more blocks to work with).

My living room floor had been covered with all sorts of fabric for the better part of two weeks as I contemplated what I wanted the quilt to look like.  I wanted scrappy and colorful.  But I couldn't decide - did I want to focus on the circles?  the Xs?  Then I found Deb's Flowering Snowball.  That quilt was seven blocks square and mine would only be five, but it was still enough to make a mandala-like pattern, which appealed to me.

After that, I spent a few more days with pen and crayons trying to draw what I wanted to do.  Slowly my pile of fabric on the floor dwindled to blue, purple and yellow-golds.  I had a drawing that seemed close enough to what I wanted to start cutting.  Still, so many questions!  Blue and purple, or just blue?  Gold towards orange or gold towards tan? 

Now that I have a few pieces cut and on the board, some things are starting to gel.  First, the orange-gold won for color.  I think I may use a mix of blue and purple.  Second, I can't make this with just my stash - there's too much contrast.  I either need some lighter blue or some darker gold.  Plus I don't have quite enough yardage.  I thought I do an off-white for the orange peel portion of the quilt, but now I'm not so sure - I think I want cream.  Looks like a trip to the fabric shop!

I put together one partial piece, enough to prove I cut the pattern correctly and the curves weren't going to be too difficult.  Otherwise, I'm stuck - this is the type of quilt I will completely lay out before sewing.  I can't cut more pieces until I know if I'm moving to darker golds or lighter blue.  But I have a feel for the colors and yardage I need when I finally get to the quilt shop next Saturday.  It's not a terrible break point - I'll be focused on the next Project Quilting challenge most of the week.  Can't wait to work on this some more!