Welcome to your next stop on the Winter Blues blog hop hosted by Carla of Creatin In The Sticks. Blue – especially the turquoise/teal/aqua family – is a staple in my color palette. My blue scrap bin is always overflowing and my blue fabric stash is constantly replenished. I was tempted to start a new project for this blog hop but this is January, and we usually start the year with well-meaning resolutions. One of my resolutions this year is to complete an unfinished project before starting a new one.
I started this project in 2017. I had some batik charm squares (5″ squares) and I wanted to practice making hour-glass blocks – making sure the points match perfectly at the center. I found this picture on my phone of the front and back of a couple of blocks. The background is Kona sky – which is a nice light blue. It looks more like grey or white in the pictures but the subtle blue is very pleasing in person. Some of the batiks are Island Batik and I’m not sure about the other brand.
I had made 16 Ohio star blocks in 2017 and had pieced them into two sections of 2 X 4 blocks with a wide sashing in between. This was before I had a long arm and I may have planned to quilt it in two sections and then join them together. I am not sure why I abandoned this project but it sat in a box for over two years. This month I made 4 more Ohio star blocks in blue for a total of 5 rows of 4 stars each.
I quilted in the ditch around each star and used simple swirls in the background. To make it a bit interesting, I quilted straight lines between some stars. I love the look of swirls or feathers contrasted next to closely quilted straight lines.
It has been raining non-stop for over 48 hours. Hence the indoor pictures. I will take nicer pictures outdoors once it clears up and the sun is out.
Please visit the other blogs participating in the blog hop today:
Websterquilt
Songbird Designs
Cynthia’s Creating Ark
Storied Quilts – You are HERE!
Patchwork Breeze
Seams To Be Sew
HeARTsCreations
Becky’s quilts and adventures
DesertSky Quilting
Ha, ha, I understand about the 48 hours of rain stuff! The pictures look beautiful, and show the quilt off well. I think the quilting is extraordinary, and the colors in the quilt are just perfect for making a drifting color effect. Thanks for sharing.
I really love the contrast between the swirls and straight line quilting. Not only interesting but nice and refreshing. My favorite interpretation of the ‘Winter Blues Blog hop”. The swirls (snow) and the straight lines (freezing rain)…. plenty of that here in Maine. All mixed in together with s sort of wintery landscape of stars. I loved the above word picture of ‘drifting’. That is perfect! I too saw drifting snow banks. Best of all, finishing a quilt that has already been started. Even though I tend to stick with a quilt project from start to finish, I do have several that I had cut and set aside all packaged up. I did that after reading an article about cutting up fabric. At the time I thought it was a good idea but found out it has only sat on a shelf…. nicely cut and ready to along with all the directions that I had written out. And reading how this blog hop inspired you to finish this quilt is meaningful to me. BTW, I don’t precut any quilts anymore. I save it until I am actually ready to make the quilt. This post has encouraged me to pull out one I have prepped in blue and yelllows. Maybe even sandwich it in between my current one for a granddaughter and the one I plan to make for her brother. Both are college aged and need another quilt. We had recently renovated our bedroom so there is a new snowball quilt done in warm fabrics for the winter. This prepped quilt is for the summer for the bed, which is a sleigh bed. Lol, can’t get away from this winter theme here. Thanks again as you did a great job as an ambassador to help us get projects done!!!
This quilt definitely brings a little sunshine to the rainy days.
Lovely quilt and cheerful for those rainy days.
Hi Vasudha! What a beautiful quilt, and a fabulous project for practicing the hourglass block. The straight-line quilting in between some of the stars is so striking and it’s offset so nicely with the swirls surrounding it. Kind of the soft meeting the hard – it’s very cool. It looks to me like your points match quite perfectly. Thanks for sending the rain up our way only we get snow out of the system. It’s supposed to snow through Saturday afternoon! That’s a long time . . . so you wouldn’t be getting any outdoor photos up this way either. Love your finished quilt and it’s fabulous that it is a UFO. ~smile~ Roseanne
admiring your quilt is a beautiful way to start my day . Love the colors and your quilting is over the top.
I love this quilt, it looks so vintage to me and vintage is my favorite. We’ve been getting a lot of rain as well. It started again last night, rain, snow, freezing rain and sleet. It’s expected to continue through today. Good day to cuddle under that quilt.
What a beautiful quilt. We’ve been having rain off and on, and it will probably be overcast when I try to take my pics this afternoon!
Oh my, that’s just beautiful. I love the way you combined your quilting too. What a perfect finish that doesn’t make anyone “blue” 🙂
Love your teals (my favorite!) and your quilting is yum!!! I love the unexpected straight lines mixed with the swirls…definitely ups the interesting factor!!
Congratulations on ‘finish’. The quilt is lovely with all it’s twinkling stars and the blues help the ‘winter blues’!
I saw your post on my phone earlier today and couldn’t wait to see the pics on a larger screen. Your use of color is so artistic, refined and fun. Once again your quilting just takes the project to another level. So nice.
Very pretty quilt!
Love your colour choice!
Such a NICE finish – you go girl! I personally like your resolve to finish one UFO before starting another. Wish you all the best in sticking with it! Super job quilting it! Thanks for sharing your inspiration & creativity with all of us.
Very nice!!! Lovely quilting! Like the touch of yellow and green definitely makes it twinkle.
So pretty, and great quilting. I am so happy that you finished something you started before, too. Getting the UFOs done is so personally rewarding.
I really like the mixture of colors you have in your quilt. Perfect!
That definitely needed to be moved from the UFO pile to the lovely finish that it is.
We are also getting a lot of rain. Great indoors quilting time, right? Your quilt is really pretty.
What a pretty quilt for the Hop. It looks like you had SEW much fun with the quilting!
This quilt is certainly twinkling today. Maybe it is your sunshine in days of rain?! Love the quilting you did too. I’m so glad you were able to use the hop to finish this one. It’s gorgeous. Thank you for joining the Winter Blues Blog Hop!
Great colors and Ohio stars are one of my favorites. Love how you quilted too. It really drew my attention.
Very pretty design and choice of colors.
Lovely Ohio stars. Looks like you have perfectly pointy points to me. Love the quilting on this finish, too. Congrats on getting one done!
I love these blue stars and how beautiful they look in your quilt. What a great way to meet a goal by finishing this lovely quilt! I hope you get some sunshine soon!
I’ve always liked the Ohio Star, but in your quilt, I love it. The colors are so perfect and your quilting raises it up. Great job.
Beautiful quilt! Totally understand the rain problems after 3 days of rain here.
I love that you were able to finish up 2017 top! It really is cheery and will chase the rainy or winter blues away.
What a great finish! I love your quilting. Thanks for sharing it!
Lovely, just lovely! You have just the right colors and values in this to make it one beautiful quilt!
The quilt and quilting are awesome! Great blend of blues!
Such a classic block to show case any color or setting – beautifully quilted as well.
So pretty – I like the quilting, really different!
great finish!!! i like all the colors you used!! thanks for linking up to Finished ( or not) Friday!! Its great to have you!!
A beautiful quilt! I love what you’ve done with the quilting. The straight lines add so much visual interest instead of an all over motif in the background.
Great finish. I like how you quilted it. Well done.
Ohio star blocks are one of my favorites. Love the addition of the orange and green.
Hi Vasudha, Good for you for resisting the urge to start a new project! This one is really perfect for the Winter Blues blog hop. I especially like your quilting – what a great idea to add some straight lines in there. It’s very effective! Thanks for linking up to Free Motion Mavericks this week.
I am still in love with this quilt, so much so I am featuring it in Put your foot down this week. Thank you for linking up last week.