madness

I've been mulling this one over for a while. Adam has always had such a strong, clean, simple design aesthetic, and as a result I ripped up more designs for this quilt than any other I've ever attempted.

Everything was too complicated.

A year ago I learned how to make itty bitty stars. They were okay, but not great. My skills have improved since that time. I've learned the basics of appliqué. I feel more confident in my construction ability.

I have the fabric; I just need to commit to it. The sketch is simpler than the final colors will be — I hope to make the larger stars split half-and-half in color to make them subtler, but I wanted to post the design and be done with it.

This is a make-you-crazy quilt, the kind you think about for a year before you ever cut fabric, because you have to know exactly where you're going before you even start.

…gulp.

Some people have a bucket list. I get the general idea but I find the approach depressing. I'd rather think of the process of life instead of focusing on its endpoint; as a result, I refer to my list as a Life List.

#5: Successfully complete a Mariner's Compass quilt.

I accomplished a few things on my life list in 2009, and as we well know, the only thing I like better than adding things to a list is crossing something off of a list, so I've been eyeballing #5 for a while. After Adam announced his engagement, I realized his wedding quilt was likely to be as good an opportunity as any. Here was a friend who took a great deal of pleasure in subtle things that were carefully made; even two seconds' worth of thought told me that something with right angles and straight seams just wasn't going to do.