Stitched in Color

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Love in Carnival: a bee quilt

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Here it is - my latest Love circle bee quilt!  It's so whimsical, so cheerful and cotton-candy pretty that it reminds me of a summer carnival.  All the different, fancy blocks are tents to visit.  Hmm... so the dresden must be the carousel.  It sends all the zigzag quilting turning, turning round the quilt.

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I had such a time arranging the blocks.  A fun time!  I so enjoy the challenge of juggling blocks, discovering the quilt on a design wall.  Not knowing what's going to happen keeps me intellectually engaged and motivated to keep working.   It's such a different energy from working on repetitive quilt blocks.  (Those can be relaxing though!)

Here's where I started, with every single block on the front.

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Although the top of the quilt did follow that layout, I found I needed to simplify quite a bit throughout the bottom half of the quilt.

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The removed blocks made for an interesting quilt back.  All's well that ends well!

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This bee quilt is made with the Love circle of do. Good Stitches.  Each circle of do. Good Stitches makes for a particular charity.  Ours go to children throughout the world via Wrap Them in Love.  It's such a blessing to be a part of a team making a difference!

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Soo... I tried something new with the quilting.  I've been free motion quilting for over a year now, but always curvy.  Straight lines are much harder for me to make free motion.  Why do straight lines without a walking foot?  Well, if you can FMQ straight lines then you can do designs that would require too much turning of the quilt otherwise.  It can really free you up!

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For this quilt I did a zigzag quilting design that originates as an echo from the dresden block.  From there it spirals around the quilt in a continuous zigzag line. I didn't really know if that would work until I tried.  Haha!  I did have to add a few new zigzag peaks here and there to keep them a manageable size.  To make those slight pattern aberrations blend in, I did them over light or busy areas of the quilt (I'm using white thread).  That worked!  There are lots of not-straight lines in this quilt, but you know how it is... only a quilter would notice/care.  I'm just glad I gained the experience, which will open new doors!

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All in all, I'm definitely happy with Love in Carnival - the journey and the results.  Thanks again to my bee-mates for taking up my open-ended prompt:

Jessica of A Little Gray

Daisy of Ants to Sugar

Ara Jane of you know what i love

Natalie of Greenleaf Goods

Cat of Ups & Downs

Deborah of Little Ms. Sew-Unsew

Jacey of Jaceycraft

Jenelle of Echinops & Aster

Amanda of My Sewcial Hour

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And thanks to all members of do. Good Stitches for giving of your time, creativity and precious fabrics to bless others in need!