Blues and Greens

A couple of hours upstairs using the sewing machine and then an hour or two of sitting on the deck handstitching seemed like a pleasant way to spend an afternoon.

And the result...a patchy pad for an underused bench on the patio. This has been in my mind for some time and I decided to just do it one day without overthinking it. I grabbed blue and green fabrics from my stash (which I'm trying to whittle down), used my rotary cutter to make strips of varying widths, and stitched them together in one long piece. I tried to not spend too much time planning which fabrics looked best next to each other, but I did make sure the fabrics were evenly distributed.

This bench is about 6 feet long, or 7 or 8 (I'm too lazy to go down and measure it, but I know my 6 foot husband can stretch his length along it). I used two layers of cotton batting in the middle and some leftover white quilted fabric for the backing. I wasn't planning on doing any handquilting. The binding was leftover strips cut to 3 1/2 inches, stitched together, pressed in half wrong sides together and machine stitched to the right side of the pad, then turned over and handstitched to the other side (a french binding), able to withstand some wear and tear because of the double thickness.

I remember a saying from my childhood, "Blue and green should never be seen, except in a washing machine." I think it was an old time rule for not wearing the two colours together. I personally think they look great together and I'm pretty sure God agrees with me considering all hydrangeas, irises, forget-me-nots, delphiniums, and a host of other green and blue combinations.

It was fun to spend a little time stitching. I haven't done as much as I would have liked recently. I'm working on another course - it's my "summer school." I have one paper left and the exam so it's getting close to being finished. I'm thinking my next project might be some patchwork pillows in the same blues and greens.