Summer 2014 and QDAD

Summer 2014 update:

- Finished the top of my string quilt! 

- Working on some improv piecing blocks for part of the back of that quilt (rest will be a medium gray)

- Joined the QDAD facebook group (quilt design a day) - I learned about this from posts of interviews on Sew Mama Sew and thought it sounded like a cool idea.  I have actually been pretty terrible about designing my quilts before I start and actually have tended to pick designs/patterns that didn't require any planning or designing (see string quilt!) besides picking colors.  But more and more the past few years I have fallen in love with improv-like quiltes or asymmetrical quilts and quilts with lots of negative space... things that really need a bit more planning to look good, or at least to not waste a bunch of fabric!

When I joined QDAD there were ~275 people in the group and I figured there would be lots of designs posted every day and I would be intimidated.  Well, turns out there weren't really many people posting, though they were posted some pretty nice designs and I was a little bit intimidated. Especially because the posts are 'public' on facebook, so other people not in the group could see them, too. But I finally decided I just didn't care and designed something and posted it!

"First"

Turns out people were super-nice, gave great feedback and constructive criticism, and were helpful with some of the computer program issues I was having. And I have stuck with it for a week now, one design per day! (I'm not expecting to keep this up after fall semester starts... but who knows? They are only supposed to take ~15 minutes!) They are inspired and use the color palette from one of the Design Seeds pictures for that day.  Sometimes I have really not liked my design, other times I think they're ok, and one or two I've really liked.

I'm beginning to love designing ... now, to find a bit more time to actually make some of these!

Maybe a future post will be all my designs up until that point.