Rookie Mistakes

Today, I got a package from Fabric Depot that I ordered three weeks ago:


I like Fabric Depot but they take FOREVER to deliver.

While I was in Oklahoma, I was only able to dart into quilt shops in short time slots. We were sharing a car and needed to be about three places at once most of the time we were there. I visited The Savage Quilter in Oklahoma City - a very cute, very new shop that I liked alot. I fell in love with this fabric by Moda (called Blossoms):


I also visited Sooner Quilts and Oklahoma Quiltworks - all good shops. Here are my souvenir fabrics from Oklahoma:


This has been a tough couple of weeks. I promised myself I would make time to work on the Austria block this weekend. Jezebel has her radiation therapy - I have my quilting therapy. I got started on it about 8:00 p.m. I had to do some tidying up of the sewing room because I had company staying in here right before we left and never had a chance to get back in there and set things straight. My beloved Janome was good to go because I cleaned and oiled her thoroughly before I left. I set out my paper piecing stuff:


I have been looking for an opportunity to use fabric from my black jelly roll:


As I got started on the Austria block, I began by making my first rookie mistake. What mistake? The mistake of starting with a fabric I was smitten with instead of one that would enhance the pattern. I REALLY wanted to use my Savage Quilter fabric but it would have gone better with a block that had larger pieces.

The second rookie mistake I made was in rigidly keeping with red and blue as rays. Since this was a block that should have resulted in a three-D look, and since I used a background that was predominately red, it guaranteed that the red rays were going to wash out.


I should have gone with a white ray. That could have looked pretty cool, especially since there is black in the block. I also could have used some light blue to match some of the blossoms. I knew I was getting myself into this problem and pretended it wouldn't happen. I need to start putting together a quarter before I complete the rest of a paper pieced block. That would probably go a long way towards helping me catch design disasters while they are still fixable.

So here is how the Austria block turned out.


Blah. No easy way to fix it so I will just live with it. Perhaps if I go with a quilt design that is on point, it will look better.


And looking on the back, I can see that the lines didn't line up. I have no idea how I got so far off.


I managed to square it and still save the points but this block is not going to be very forgiving come time to put it with the others.

My girls weren't really too much help, tonight. Jezebel snoozed in the bathtub and Evelyn sprawled in the hallway looking somewhat like an accident victim that had been thrown from a car. I think I will call it a night and see if I can find time to work on another block and perhaps redeem myself, tomorrow.