Well, this was a quick and easy block, started and finished in three days. Once that central piece with the striped ivory satin and fawn velvet was embroidered in both stitches in cream which I had never done before and fawn stitches which were my favourites, the rest came easily. I wanted to get rid of some of the angles of the striped patch so covered some of the seams with heavy lace motifs, the bottom edges though were left straight. The block was easy until I got to the last seam - the one at the bottom left. DH and I tried about a dozen braids and laces but nothing seemed to be right so in the end, I stitched the braid, embroidered some of it to match the striped block and added cream ribbon roses. Not perfect but better than a lot of the others. I am beginning to realise that this quilt is a reflection of my life. Every stitch, lace, button, braid, trim is something that I have learnt, collected or gleaned along the way. From now on, each block will have a theme, albeit a mental one - people in my family, childhood holidays by the beach, picnics in the forests with my parents and younger sister, picking wildflowers, school friends and favourite teachers, piano lessons, my Grandma and her Scottish heritage, my children and grandchildren, my sister's children and grandchildren, my lovely Mum and her love of sewing......so many influences that have shaped me into the person that I am today. At first, the blocks in this quilt were merely that, blocks worked in cream laces and threads on cream fabrics but as they have grown in number they are taking on personalities and identities of their own. Anyway, this is number 16 or the block that completes 1/6 of the quilt. I laid them out on the table in no particular order to see how they are going to look when sewn together. I was surprised at how many darker creams I have used to form the contrast in colour without even realising that I was doing it.
