Anomalous ~ A Quilt

Officially, the first completed quilt of the year!  As always, it takes a little bit of time to get back in to the swing of things.  For the past couple years the first quilt of the year has been one made of my hand dyed fabrics, this year was no exception.  Funny how a tradition in born without even knowing it!

This one may be a little different than previous years.  Usually it involved a huge stack of half square triangles.  This time my goal was to use scraps.  Strips and strips, piece after piece.  In order to keep things under control and avoid fabric chaos, I got in the habit of cutting scraps in to squares or in this case strips.  The strips varied in width and length ~ 1" to 2" wide.  They would become something one day, that I was sure of.  

So, I brainstormed.  An idea eventually started to form, and I began the long process of piecing blocks.  Many of my ideas start small and I work through them as I go.  This was going to be another one of those! 

Width of the blocks wasn't as important as the height of the blocks.  Most were 7" high, but for variety sake, I threw in some 6" blocks.  

The trick was how many blocks?  How many rows?  Do I really know what I'm doing?! Ultimately, I settled on 5 vertical and 12 horizontal rows.  To make things even crazier, each row was going to be different.  

While I tried to keep the vertical blocks semi centered, not one row is the same.  I've seen many stacked quilts where the math is the same for each row.  You just stagger each row. This is not that quilt.  You see...I love to do it the hard way! 

My basic layout was settled on, the real test would be adding the grey in between! Controlled, yet not.

Somehow I managed it.  Somehow it came together just as I had hoped it would.  Somehow the clouds parted and a ray of sunshine ... maybe not.  

Basting.  Pinning and pinning and pinning.  After which it sat for a week.  I stared at it for a solid week wondering if I should get crazy with it or keep it simple.  

I know this will be a surprise to some of you, a real shocker in fact...but it was straight line quilting to the rescue!  

For each horizontal row, I quilted random width lines.  The exception was and occasional 6" row where it was just 1/2" lines.  

I couldn't be happier, especially after once it was pulled from the drier!

While I was making this quilt, I took meticulous notes.  For me, really great notes.  Or so I think!  Once I work up an EQ7 design I'll show you just how crazy I got with it!

Anomalous
52" x 69 1/2"

Anomalous:  deviating from or inconsistent with the common order, form or rule; irregular or abnormal

I'm not sure Anomalous is the best name for my quilt.  I'm trying to be clever...Stacked works too...but it's a little boring!  

Quilting wasn't the only thing put on the back burner!  Between the bitter cold, wind, ice, snow and now rain, it has been tough getting great pictures.  I had to become creative, but use what I could.  A few inside, a few on the screen porch and the bedroom floor worked well for a couple too!  

What do you do if Mother Nature won't cooperate for your photo shoot?  I was impatient. Waiting is not my strong suit!  

LINKING:

TGIFF

Can I Get A Whoop Whoop

Crazy Mom Quilts

OH Scrap!
Sew Cute