Park Bench, Sorta

Funny how things appear to be on track, and then get derailed. Such is the case with my Park Bench, Sorta. 

Started in a Quilt Club I belong to, we were supposed to use the Park Bench pattern as a color wheel study, making each block different colors. Well, that wasn't going to work for me, not that I have anything against using the color wheel. It's that I don't care for quilts without a unifying color scheme. Granted, the blocks are variations on a basic unit, and the background remains the same, but to come up with fifteen different color combinations was not where I wanted this quilt to go. It evoked the same feelings I have when faced with cutout sugar cookies to decorate. I'm creative for a few of them, then the creativity fades to just slapping the icing on to get them done.

So, now you know why this is Park Bench, Sorta, because it's like those sugar cookies - the creativity was lost after three blocks. I started with the intent to use coral throughout,

and by the third one, I was bored with that. So, I thought, alright, I'll try using other colors. Hence a try with yellow, which did not get sewn into a complete block. Uninspired, the idea of completing the whole quilt was further derailed. 

What to do now? Me being me, I wasn't going to let the pieces go to waste. Piecing them together made a whole new, more interesting quilt. Check out my post Park Bench Sort Of to see how I put it together. 

Done! It's a quilt top! Time to move on. And so it sat, derailed once again due to the t-shirt quilts, banished to the UFO pile. But now, the t-shirt quilts are done (she loves them, by the way!), so it's time to delve into that UFO pile and finish things up.

Deciding to just have fun quilting this, with inspiration from Judy Woodworth's Freemotion Quilting book (affiliate link), it quickly got on the frame.

Nesting swirls make up the background.

And a variety of fills went in other areas.

The three main blocks got coordinating heart motifs that I drew to fit the jewel shape.

And now it's a finish, after a long weekend trying to get the binding done. Maybe the name means I just had to sit on it, and let life unfold for a while.

My mom really likes it, so maybe I'll hang it in her room for a while. But it may end up as a baby gift - grey flannel with pink birds are on the back.

Really, I can't keep them all!

Have a great day quilting!