I loved reading all of your reactions and ideas to the Economy Star sketches and fabric options I shared. Of course there was support for every one. It just goes to show that there is no right or wrong when it comes to art and fabric choices!

Still, I noticed that the Parade sketch had by far the most widespread appeal. I love how Maria said of Parade’s center, “something mysterious, something beautiful can happen there.”

My plan was to make both the Parade and Chorus layouts in turn, starting with Chorus for this quilt. For my star points, I chose the Wasabi yellow solid for two main reasons. One, the yellow feels sunny and joyful - just like spring. Two, I feel that Heather Ross fabrics in this patchwork block style would become quite busy without some negative space.

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This week I’ve been snatching time at my work table in between longarm quilting and housework. It’s been a slow start. From the beginning I was worried that the yellow stars would be hard to spot in the Chorus layout. I thought to use value to my advantage by making star centers that are slightly darker value than the other blocks. My first block (the one with the purple moth center) seemed dark enough at first, but as I continued sewing blocks, I wasn’t so sure.

At the top left of the above image you can see my stack of even darker value Heather Ross fabrics. Some of these are nice for fussy cut economy block centers.

In contrast, here are the low value fabrics that I could fussy cut for the center of the remaining Economy blocks.

It seemed like a fine plan, but things didn’t pan out. I found myself making blocks that were too in-between. The medium-value fabrics and bright reds and oranges seemed likely to overpower the Wasabi yellow. As a result the Chorus layout was hard to spot.

What to do? Well, I do want to use all the fabrics, and I do want to enjoy sewing economy blocks just for fun, without getting bogged down in careful value relationships. So, I’ve decided to use Parade after all.

As Aby pointed out, Chorus will succeed much easier if the colors for each star block vary, making it easy to visually separate each star. Perhaps I’ll do that for my scrappy version later this year? I’m not sure. But for now, Parade it is.

Hopefully this weekend I’ll get to sew more blocks!