Fabric Exchange - My Project and a Gift for a Friend

I think I mentioned a while back that I had participated in a fabric exchange with a few ladies in May.

Well, one of the ladies made up her quilt and it was so beautiful, 

that I decided I had to start working on my fabrics.

We were to all bring 6 different fabrics, cut into 6 inch squares

and enough for all the participants.

We had some that were not able to participate, so we each ended up

with about 70 squares.

I took mine and tried to sort them according to color.

I also had to chose a background color and had the choices of

black, tan, or cream. I went with the cream.

I cut them into 5 1/2" squares (to make them all the same size)

And then I sewed them into half-square triangles.

I thought of a zig-zag pattern,

but, it was way too crazy, then I paired them to look like chevrons

It still wasn't right

then I thought, maybe just squares

I took several pictures and emailed them all to my design team

aka: my daughters.

After hearing their suggestions on color placement,

I came up with this

I also decided to add a border and them more smaller half chevrons.

This is how it turned out with the borders and binding.

A smaller chevron strip on the back with the label.

Then on to the quilting. I echoed the chevron pattern in the print areas and

did a vine in the cream areas. 

It was my first time using a method that a friend told me about. (Thanks Nancy)

You can read about it here.

It is a way that you don't drop the feed dogs... but read up on it.

I need to practice like crazy to be able to do it really good. But I couldn't resist trying it out.

I hope my friend likes it as much as I do.

Happy Birthday (late as usual) G.

Now I need to finish a rug for another friend's Jan birthday. 

Nothing like being late to the party, huh?