scrap bag quilt

I posted this scrap quilt on my other blog a week or two ago but it wasn't finished. Now it has a 3 inch border/binding in a deep purple which continues to emphasize the brightness of the scrap strips. They are foundation pieced on drier sheets-- I loved making it, quickly without any need to measure; using many of my scraps -- but actually not even half of them.

Since then I have made another using the same method but toning down the drama, I've use light blue stripping  and will use a blue border/binding -- all scraps, of course. And I still have about half my scrap bag of strips and scraps and may eventually make a third (although I've use up quite a lot of the drier sheets I had saved over a couple of years.

I'm contemplating writing an essay (or even a how-to) book about making a quilt using your scraps in a totally sponatenous way, ignoring almost all the rules of the "Quilt Police" -- no measuring, various widths of the strips, no concern for color matching or pattern harmony ... it all works fine, as you can see. Or maybe not everyone agrees -- that depends on one's OCD burden. (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder) -- I have almost none. I never never been a perfectsionist. I hate the rules and I know I'm pretty bad at color choices. I love the total freedom of making this quilt. The drier sheets are all the same size (used of course- most had to be lightly ironed, being a bit crumpled) so I simply started with a corner to corner strip and added from there.  I DID have to begin every other one from the opposite corner to get the diamond pattern (and of course, pay attention to that pattter as I laid them out. But that's it. The quilting is simply in the strips -- I don't enjoy quilting so I don't do a lot -- the old rule about needing a lot of quilting is horse manure in these days when batting is in sheets. (I am aware that people with long arm quilting machines do LOTS of quilting -- it's their  pleasure, but not mine.)

Later this week I will put up a picture of the second strip scrap quilt -- it will have a very different feel. I'd be quliting it today but it's a very hot and humid day and I don't feel like sitting at the sewing
machine with my lap full of fabric and batting.