Trees Again

Here hang seven beautiful autumn tree quilts ready for quilting. As I reported in an earlier post, our group has been working with a new technique each month, and trapezoids were the challenge for October . I designed the block and wrote the instructions to go with the pattern and then started to cut for a sample quilt. Did I write "a" sample quilt?
The trouble is, when you get out a piece of fabric, cut out a few pieces, fold it up and put it back, the whole process has to be repeated over and over until that piece of fabric is used up. That is a huge waste of time, especially when you are wanting to use up the scraps and get nice quilts done at the same time. So, the result is the seven quilts you see here, an 8th new one now hanging, and a 9th on the way because some blocks were left over or squared up too small. The blocks are cut and will be stitched soon.

A photo of a tree in my front yard shows that the traditional "pine tree" shape works to represent the autumn theme by use of other colors, even though a shape that represents another type of tree was used in the quilts. It's amazing to see all the qhilts hanging in one row and view all the colors and fabrics used that one would not think of as representing "trees."

You will notice that not all of the trees are alike. When I started to run out of a fabric so that I did not have enough for four tiers of trapezoids, I just cut a wider top and loger trunk. The ladies in the quilt group did not notice that right away, and it was quite a surprise when they discovered the changes. They were subtle, but provide more interest in the quilt top.

I stitched up about 130 of the tree blocks during the month, and I amazed myself with what I got done. I should almost be a master at trapezoids now, but I'm not. I need to get out that "point trimmer" from my notions box to inprove accuracy.

I used donated quilt room fabrics and stash to make the tops--and it did not seem to dimish the pile at all. Why is that?