Friday, February 22, 2008

Help Me Crafty Bloggosphere. You're my only Hope.

Those of you who have been following my blog for a while know that I am plagued with blank white walls. I know, you may find this hard to beleive considering how colourful my quilts and my prose (hem hem) are, but my walls are virtually blank. This is what happens when you spend years of your life spending all your money on education and gas ( to drive to work and assorted educational institutions) and have never actually spent time in your house before. Why stay at home and look at your blank walls when there is that little sushi resteraunt down the road, or Chapters just a 10 min. drive away?

Well, times have changed and we're not in BC anymore. There is no chapters. There are no sushi resteraunts. The local coffee shop closes at 6pm most nights. And though we have been here for 3 years we still have relatively blank walls.

Since this winter will not end, and I am tired of looking at a platte of blank white snow outside and blank beige walls inside, I have decided it is time to put something on the walls. Since I don't have three or four hundred dollars to unload on a large piece of art, I decided I should do something in fabric. Incidentally this justifies buying more fabric, which is a side bonus.

I am thinking of just making 9 squares (but then I was thinking rectangles -- about 13"x17") sashed with cream fabric and bound in something green or pink, and these were the fabrics I thought I would use at first:

But then when I arranged them in a square, I found the yellow one too busy, so I was left with this:
I was thinking of either putting another piece of fabric in it, or some sort of pieced block or applique (a picture made out of cut out and sewn on fabric, for you non-sewers out there). The whole I idea was that it should be quick, though, since I have a lot of other things on the go, and Aaron keeps climbing up and trying to get his fingers sewn over when I try to sew during the day, so my sewing time is now confined to the evening, since I'm trying really hard not to stay up into the wee hours of the night anymore.

I tried a few different things for the centre fabric. I think this one is too light. I'm kicking myself for not getting the one with the orange birds and brown flowers. I really don' want to wait to order that online, though, and I can't get this kind of stuff locally.
Option number two is to put a swatch of the decor fabric I'm making pillows out of. But, well, its home decor fabric and its hard to do it justice in a 13 x 17 rectange, as much as I love love love this fabric:
This is actually the one I liked the best. I am hesitating, however, becuase I actually bought this fabric to make a curtain for my entry way (the only area of my house that is decorated), and I wouldn't have enough to do that if I cut a big square out of it. Which means ordering one metre of fabric online. This is not very cost effective because the shipping is usually about $6, but ordering many metres is, well, also not very cost effective.
I could suck it up and order more, I guess. Or I could change my plan and do something with smaller pieces of fabric and use the yellow paisley at the top. I don't know. So, help me through my dilemma, dear readers. What do you think?

2 comments:

K. said...

how about something completely different? Like a piece of something plain (I'm thinking of the yellow/orange tones in the current fabric choices) and maybe doing an applique or embroidery of the outline of your boys hands. Making it not only a totally unique piece, but a capture in time of just how little your little guys are right now.

but I'm totally not a quilter, so that could be a crazy idea. :)

Dana said...

Oh man! Love the Amy Butler and Heather Bailey fabrics together. So, what did you ultimately decide to do???