Lost for words

I am not often short of words, but on this occasion I need one more than I have.  

I have finished the column on the right hand side that was nearly there last time I posted.

And started to work with the remaining three birds, which need to go over on the left.  If you look at the picture above and then the one below you will see that my first step was actually to chop a load of stuff off one of my little blocks.

I didn't dislike it, but just couldn't get things to balance properly and decided that a rethink was in order.  This was partly because I had quite a clear idea of where I want the words in this column to fall and that big chunk was just making it impossible.  Taking it back to a smaller shape gave me much more room for manoeuvre.  

I also ended up shifting the birds around for the umpteenth time.  I'm done now though: this is where they will be staying.

Now I need to print one more word, to go in that gap.

Linking up Off the Wall Friday.

Three suns rising

I've finally made it back to my yellow birds today, and had quite a productive morning.

I grew my last sun block until it fitted with its fellows.

then I added them all onto the big piece I'd already done.

Then, for the umpteenth time I laid out my remaining yellow birds, changed my mind twice and ended up with the chunk that is now in the bottom right corner. All I need to do now is attach the top bird and then this side can be added on.

The remaining birds are not so much a well thought out set as the ones I haven't wanted anywhere else, so I'm hoping that they will not take this amiss and that I can piece them together without too much difficulty.  If that goes smoothly then I can think about what next.  

Chinese coins and a bit of déjà vu

For slightly complicated reasons I find I can't work on the yellow birds today so thought I'd have a think about the AHIQ challenge set by Ann.  Funnily enough I have always liked Chinese Coins, and looking back there are a couple of quilts where I started with the explicit idea of using this sort of structure.  

The first was Inner City:my original idea was to use bigger strips of the city fabric along with lots of 'coin' strips.  You can see from this early picture what I had in mind.

 I kind of veered off a bit after that, but I think you can still see elements of that initial idea in the finished quilt.

By a strange coincidence I started with a similar basic idea in the current quilt. Again, looking at an early picture you can see how this would work, incorporating the bird bits with coin-type strips.

This one has, of course, moved even further away from that starting point.

So I am going to try again.  My starting fabrics literally just came from a pile sitting on the table waiting to be tided away, though I may add stuff from my boxes as I get going.  I'm interested to see whether what I will end up with this time.  My personal challenge (thanks, Stephie) is to see if I can produce something that works whichever way up I look at it.

Linking up with NinaMarie for Off the Wall Friday.

Spot the difference

A little bit more progress, though I have also spent quite a bit of time just mindlessly making flying geese.  I don't really mind that; it's quite soothing just running stuff through the machine and it's good to have plenty of little units to play around with.

When I started this morning this is what my floor looked like.  The first thing I did was so go backwards, which is to say that there were a couple of bird bits that I decided I didn't like and I have pulled them to pieces.  There was one in particular where the little dark bird was right on the top edge and the whole thing looked sort of round-shouldered to me.  I've liberated it from its surroundings and will try again.  It is currently the middle bird on the left-hand side and now just has a tiny yellow strip added across the top to try and make it look less squashed.

The eagle-eyed amongst you may notice that the bird bits go down in different places each time I lay this out.  If I like something at the end of a session I do take a quick snap on my phone so that I can reproduce it next time. Unfortunately when push comes to shove I usually lack the discipline to keep checking that picture and just  put the pieces down in whatever way appeals to me that day.

This is where I left it today - who knows what it will look like when I start again tomorrow!

A few small words

So, in a quick gallop through yesterday's progress, I 

1. Printed some words 
2. Added the word strips into my mostly pieced sections
3. Added piecing up the right hand side and then sewed the top and bottom chunks together
4. Decided that I didn't like the two long strips in the middle at the bottom (the orange-y one and the very pale one) right next to each other so shunted the bottom bird over to the left a bit and added some more geese.

This last move meant, of course that I had a tall thin gap along the top left-hand edge, but that has been filled in too, resulting in this.

Next time up I will have to get the rest of the birds out of the box and see where next.  I have noticed that these long, thin strips quite often make an appearance in my quilts and almost always as vertical, not horizontal lines. Maybe that's partly a practical solution to the problems that come with my way of piecing, maybe it's more that I like how the strong verticals anchor everything else that is going on.  To be honest I have not thought about it coherently before. Since I do like them I'm not too bothered but at the same time maybe next time I'll consider alternatives.

In the meantime, I off to give some thought to Chinese Coins for the first AHIQ challenge.

Linking up with NinaMarie for Off the Wall Friday

AHIQ - share your improv #17

Taking stock -and considering all the interesting suggestions from the comments on my last post.  Yesterday I started with this: suns facing out not in, rejigged bird columns.  

I have noticed that sometimes I hold onto bits and pieces from my original starting point too long: in this case there was no reason why the birds now in the middle had to stay on the left; it was just that I had got mentally stuck with that position.  I usually catch/question myself on this sort of thing sooner or later, but if someone out there gives me the prompt, so much the better (thanks, Monica!)

But things didn't stay like this - the birds started moving and this piece (bottom right above) grew...

and found a new home.  

This is where I ended up.  

Lots of this is not yet sewn together (the horizontal yellow strips are waiting to have words printed on them - thanks, Ann!) But that was more a question of time running out than anything else.  

I know that most people who visit my site will be checking out Ann's as well, but if you haven't done so already, do go and have a look at today's post (link just below), launching the first AHIQ challenge. 

Saturday photos #84

Looking for little bits of colour amidst the greys and browns.  Red, orange, yellow, pink and blue/green.