Forty-Six - My Revised Plan of Action

Suffice it to say that I have spent HOURS and HOURS of time

pondering the seemingly millions of options for completing

the current AHIQ String Pieced Tulips QAL challenge.

I don't do hand appliqué so that route was not an option.

I've made dozens of string quilts including my Dumpster Diving series.

Which left the concept of tulips as the remaining challenge focus for me.

But with my chosen color palette inspired by the glorious images

from January 20, 2021, I was stumped over how to incorporate

all of them into a coherent whole.

So what am I going to do?

1.  Edit my palette.

2.  Honor my own way of doing things as well as the squirrel in me.

3.  Stop pondering and start making.

Step one was to edit my palette.

This large wall of pieced-together light blues

caused a massive attack of "blank journal page syndrome"

aka utter creative paralysis.

So it has been folded like yardage and put back on the stash shelf.

The colors that struck me the most on Inauguration Day

were those worn by Jill Biden, Kamala Harris, and Amanda Gorman

namely their aqua/teal/turquoise, purple, and that glorious yellow.

So the dark blues, pinks, creams, and reds were returned to the stash shelves.

But with several hundred inspiration images still haunting me,

now what?

Step two involves honoring my inner squirrel.

So I pulled another project from the gestation closet - 

one that featured even more inspiration from this book 

and that project's stack of  aqua/turquoise yardage.

By combining that project's ideas/yardage with Forty Six's challenge

and my own sensibilities, I have finally found my path forward.

I sorted through that box of hastily cut strips,

removing the reds, blues, creams, pinks, and blue violets

leaving only the red violets, yellows, and aqua/turquoise groups.

Step three involves MAKING instead of more thinking.

I will make the tulip centers from these newly-string-pieced yellow slabs.

I will make the left and right tulip petals from

the newly-string-pieced red violet slabs.

The stems and leaves will logically be from the basket of scrappy greens.

All of these will then be machine appliquéd in place.

 I will make my background blocks from this range of yardage - 

meaning those boxes of leftover teal/aqua/turquoise strips in the previous photo

 will go back to the closet for future Etcetera projects.

While any backing choice is still up in the air 

I plan to use this colorful batik for binding.

* * *

I cannot tell you how good it feels to have forward momentum again!

* * *

Note:  I will also be sharing this post on the AHIQ blog

where you can find other participant's related posts

using the hashtag #AHIQStringTulipQAL

Quiltdivajulie

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“Color is the keyboard, the eyes are the harmonies, the soul is the piano with many strings. The artist is the hand that plays, touching one key or another, to cause vibrations in the soul.”

Wassily Kandinsky