Red is the new neutral!

I'm taking part in a QAL hosted by Sujata Shah on Basket full of Scraps . This post is almost identical to one on that group blog. My "Overlapping Octagons" is progressing, but nowhere near completion. Here are the units I've made so far, randomly placed on the design wall.

Overlapping Octagons: Try-out on the design wall with 4.5" red (the new neutral) centres.

I thought I would use as many of my 19th century reproduction fabrics as possible to make space in my sewing room. Unfortunately most of the "reds" look more like brown, so I shall be adding brighter reds to the mix.There was not much blue, and that has nearly all been used now.

I started by planning to use neutral squares; changed my mind to using red ones; changed back to planning neutral and went for it. I forgot to take a photo, but 4.5" neutral squares, surrounded by dark blue strips were so boring! I decided to go back to the red plan and to add neutral and green as well as orange to the strings. The neutral squares went into the hourglass blocks, and strings; cut smaller they are much less ugly/boring. So red became my new neutral!

Although I planned to cut everything freehand, that hasn't been the case. Only the hourglass blocks and some of the strings have been cut freehand, a lot of the strings are actually strips left over from other projects. I didn't dare cut the squares freehand; 4.5" is definitely still out of my comfort zone!

At present I've no idea how large I'm going to make this, and how I'm going to finish it. I'm enjoying using up scraps like this: really satisfying!

For more information about this QAL got to Basket full of Scraps .

Happy sewing

Marly.