More Biggs Planning

I was up at 4 am yesterday because my brain was so full of ideas for quilting the Biggs quilt.  After getting all those ideas out of my head and into yesterday's blog post, I set about making a test block. 

I replicated a typical intersection of the real quilt and made this with fusible.  I was wondering if it was worth the bother as by the time it was done, I had pretty well decided what I was going to do. However, during this process, I noticed a secondary "circles" pattern in the center of each block I decided to focus on as well, so it was worth the effort. 

 I decided on this Shashiko pattern as a background in dark green thread.  

The previous time I did Shashiko in contrasting thread I was very pleased with the outcome.  By making the lines further away (this one was 1/4"), I hope it will have more dimension, as well as taking less time. 

This time, I  had trouble finding the right scale to do this.  And I couldn't get my head wrapped around the repeat when I drew it out with a ruler. After 3 failed attempts, I settled on a 1/2" wide scale (little squares are 1" and the cross lines 1/2 " apart).  I was able to trace that on this section.  But the more densely patterned white on white's I couldn't see through.  So I set about to make a stencil out of plastic.  There was a failed Dremmel experiment.  Today I'll be attacking the plastic with an Exacto knife. 

Meanwhile, I sorted out my greens for the border swags.   The 51 fabrics that made the cut fell into 5 groupings based on the undertone:.  light/grey  dark/blue light/yellow  medium/olive  dark/black.  After auditioning them under 3 different light conditions I decided that the olives looked best with the quilt squares, but I really liked the dark ones best.   So I pulled some from each that I thought would play well together. 

I made a stencil out of template plastic and drew the 44 swags and bows on the 4 side panels for back basting.  Got about 12 of them basted before I lost energy and went to bed early. 

Today's goals are the template and possibly the MFQ on the test block.  Hand quilting and swags the rest of the day while I watch football.