Scrappy Makes me Happy

Happy Monday quilting buds!  There's been a lot of design wall action going on in Podunk this past weekend. 

The Bonnie Hunter Mystery quilt "En Provence" has taken over the studio.  If your interested in making one you can find all the FREE quilt clues by clicking here.  Bonnie also has a Facebook page that anyone can join and post pictures of their quilts.  Not just the mystery quilt but any quilt.  Its a fun group with a lot of amazing quilting inspiration.  You can find the Facebook Quiltville Open Studio by clicking here.  Of course you need a Facebook account to join this group.  I highly recommend joining.

En Provence has been quite the new adventure for me.  It's my first and probably my last mystery.  Oh I'll still save the clues to new quilt mysteries I find on the internet, but I'll wait for the reveal before making the first fabric cut.  I found this to fun but stressful.  Bonnie is a wonderful designer so the issue isn't with her pattern but more with me and how I like to quilt.  I need to see the quilt in order to choose fabrics.  That's pretty obvious by the looks of my quilt.

 I'm not saying I don't love this quilt because I do.  Scrappy makes me happy! Below is the first block I've stitched together.  Only 15 more to go!  Should you make this quilt I suggest you press all seams open, I did not.  There's a lot of bulky seams if you follow the pressing instructions in the pattern.  Quilting it is going to be the next big challenge.  But that's what this quilt was all about for me, getting out of my comfort zone.  The best way to handle bulky seams is to avoid quilting over them.  So I'm already playing around with a few quilting designs.  

The quilt is huge 87 x 87 but I'm considering adding to the border.  Below shows the border as written in the pattern.  I may add a thin strip of border followed by more more round of 4 patches....we'll see.

My design wall is completely full and I've still not laid out the top and left border.  Can you see the one lonely pieced block near the middle?  As the block and rows go together it'll make more room for the last two borders to be added to the design wall.   Standing back and looking at a quilt helps you to see the real quilt.  Taking a picture does an even better job.  The yellow in the white circle may need to be replace.  What do you think?  I can also see I've clustered light yellows and dark yellows together.  The picture also shows that even though my blues didn't work out as well as would have liked they still show a flow in the pattern.  Well I wanted a challenge, and I got it....geesh!

While I seem to be complaining a lot about this quilt.  The journey has been interesting.  Getting out of my comfort zone is always a learning experience.  That's what I want to do, GROW as a quilter.  Maybe I will do the next Bonnie mystery quilt at the end of this year just to see what I've learned from this one.  The year is still young and there's plenty of time for more learning before the next one is started.  

~ Lea Anne ~

For those of you that have been following me for a long time the next section of this post is for you.  It's an update on my Mom.  As you know I've spent the last several years helping and taking care of both my parents during their health issues.  Mainly Mom.  Mom's fight with cancer ended last Saturday January 7th.  She died at home, with me and dad.  There were several family members who also helped us along the way. I can't thank them enough for their help and support. I also want to thank each and everyone of you for your support and prayers.  Mom often told the doctors the reason she was able to fight the hard fight was due to all of my bloggers from around the world praying for her.

If you would like to read her obituary click the link below.

My beautiful mom Letia Mason