Picnic Basket quilt - a free pattern from Martingale
The pictures on the pattern are nice soft colors, subtle… I
apparently don't understand subtle, my version ended up very Bright… like put
on your sunglasses bright…
This is the first time in a long time that I am making something that is not going to someone else. There is no deadline, no color matching. It
is very liberating, to just do something for the fun of it with no pressure. Of
course while sewing I kept thinking of who I could give it to eventually.
Sticking to my expertise of only squares and rectangles... this one was lots of fun and went together very fast. Picked out
the fabrics at Wal-Mart which is an experience in itself. The prices are so much
cheaper than the quilt store and they usually have fun novelty fabrics (like watermelons and ladybugs), but you have to take the bad with the good. Like
service. Which is usually pretty good, but I apparently was there at shift
change and waited 15 minutes when finally the little old lady from the dressing rooms came over and tried to figure it out. And while waiting, you get to see lots of folks, as the fabric is on the aisle to the bathrooms, saw Amanda and her girls!
Then a teenager came up with her prom dress in a long bag
and said she needed some fabric to match her dress so her mom could take the
fabric to the tux rental to match a cummerbund, she just stood there waiting
for someone to fetch her a piece of fabric. The dressing room/fabric lady told
her to help herself. The girl looked clueless, so I offered to help, and asked to
see the dress. She showed me and said the color was called 'pink grapefruit'. I told her if the seams were big enough she could just snip some fabric from a seam and take that to match, she looked at me like I had lost my mind, cut her dress? So I started walking down the aisle to look for a similar color while she just
stood at the cutting table to wait for me. I motioned for her to walk with me… and got more of the story
- her mom was going out of town to get a good tux, not a local Ellijay tux :).
I asked if it had to be fabric or did she need just a color, as there were
other options like yarn or silk flowers (seeing these things as I was going
down the aisle), when I noticed her nail polish, it was the exact color. I
suggested she go look at the nail polish colors and pick out one of those to
send. I told her my granddaughter was going to the prom, Madison, and she said, "I know her, she is in my grade. You are Madison's grandmother?" Sorry Madi hope I didn't embarrass you :).
Back to cutting my fabric at the table, the lady finally got
all the pieces cut, more folks were waiting by now, and then she had to figure
out the scanner. I miss the days when we had a real fabric store in town, but shopping
at Wal-Mart is always an experience and often entertaining.
free pattern HERE
