17 September 2011

I'm either crazy or stupid

About 2 weeks ago a good friend of mine contacted me to ask if I would be interested in donating a set of place mats to the Rose Festival Auction happening in October. The Rose Festival is one of Portland's major annual events, with a year of fundraising and organization, and about 2 months of various attractions, events and festivities culminating in a fair, festival, parades and a crowning princess.

I have a few sets of place mats already made, and I just figured that I would use one of those, but by the time I got the donation form a few days ago, I still hadn't decided on a set to use. That says to me I wasn't prepared to fall back on ANY of the ones I already have in stock. Dagnabit! Oh, and I have to have them done in less than a week!

Soooo, I sat up for over an hour in the middle of the night on Thursday with fabric combinations and selections swimming in my head, trying to figure out HOW I would get all of this done. I already had in my possession a good amount of a Valori Wells print from her new line, Wrenly

And my solution: pick up some of the green color way in the same print, find coordinates for both, and go to it! So, after over-sleeping (due to my 3-4:30am interlude) I grabbed some coffee on the go and headed down to visit Marie at good ol' Cool Cottons. And boy-howdy, she worked her magic, put my fears at ease and helped me get psyched for this unapproachable prospect.

I started by pulling together close to 8 prints for each side (color combo):


These selections eventually got edited down to 6 fabrics per side:

One of the things that Marie and I had discussed was bringing in a grey fabric with the greens, but it had to be just the right grey... and I got back to my studio, auditioned just about every grey-green, green-grey, green-aqua, grey-white (you get the picture) I found on the shelf, but then there was the hidden gem of what remains of my Jay McCarroll Woodland Wonderland squares. And it must have been meant to be, because once I cut what I needed for the project, I was left with this:

Friday afternoon was dedicated to the laundering of the new fabric, planning and cutting. I got far enough to lay out 1 set of six reversible mats, which will be sewn to the batting tomorrow.

Yes, it WILL get done. And binding on Monday is the plan.

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