Border, and Recycling Hands

Two more photos of this Kaleidoscope. One of you suggested using that little stripe in the border - thank you - great idea! There have been interesting comments and e-mails about, "This isn't like MY Kaleidoscope." This is the version I know about, where supposedly, you see circles formed by the straight-lined pattern. You have to look hard for circles in this project, due to my color choices. (It is NOT the pattern where you do fussy-cutting.) My blocks are about 17 inches (big!) so this is a generously-sized quilt. I'm ready to quilt it!

Now I will tell you about this "hand" project (below), with permission given.

The local town beautification group, the group that supports recycling, and keeping the town attractive, hold their meetings, and one of them mentioned that all the Directors TALK about recycling, but they weren't really DOING it. So she asked all of them to COMMIT themselves to Recycle, and in order to make a public commitment to recycling, they would sign a document. That document turned out to be a quilt. Our local group of quilting gals took up the project and we decided "Hands" would be a good visual image, along with their (a Director's) embroidered, or signed, name on a block. Each quilter took a name and based on the person whose hand they had, decorated/designed a block. ALL the materials in the quilt were recycled - nothing was purchased except the batting. It was AMAZING to see how each person interpreted the hand challenge. We used a focus fabric (border) to help coordinate color choices, and I brought in an entire TUB of old yucky fabric that NO ONE would want, but you can guess -- that old fabric was plucked out of that tub like candy.

When the blocks were returned, we looked at them and wondered how on earth would they ever blend? The sizes were different - well some of us confused the rules (ME! for one), so we just added strips on the sides to bring them up to 12 inches. In the end, those strips added a new level of interest. I had my machine and various quilting gals just gave me the orders -- "sew this, sew it on the top, sew it to this side, use this green", etc. I never gave anything a thought and by the end of that evening, it was practically all together. Bordering each block with that black print, and using the same black print in the cornerstones was extremely effective at visually holding it together. And look how that pink perked everything up!

This photo shows it not yet quilted, but I did simple straight stitch-in-the-ditch with invisible thread for the most part, and angular lines in the border.

This will be hung in their office, over their recycled couch, and will also travel and be on exhibition. "FUN" !!!

Some of the ideas: Shirt pockets, plackets, cuffs (dimensional) (one pocket has a chewed pencil in it), camoflage, a printed city map from Google Earth, jewelry, a piece (at least 20 years old) of parrot/flower fabric that had OLD fusing on it and the fusing still WORKED, sheriff star, hand holding a newspaper, 'green' thumb, a watch cut from fabric, a lacey hand on oriental fabric with a fabric ring, machine embroidered fabric sleeve, Harley Davidson cuff, Big male hands, little female hands and even one arthritic hand. One late extra block was sewn on the back for the label, with all our names signed. And one beautifully machine-embroidered block, telling what this was about.