Backgrounds

I have declared a fabric-buying "moratorium" -- a suspension of activity...

[Snort!!]

No, really! I have!! I need to slow down and finish some projects and stash shop, complete the kits and blocks of the months and what not that I have piled up in the available closet, floor and shelf space in my 12' x 15' sewing room.

I've noticed a pattern, though, in my fabric buying of late. I'm a sucker for a good background.

I took stock after I got the Kaffe/Phillip fabric and started pulling stash for Roseville by Kim McLean.  What would be a good background?!

In my closet there are bits of Marcus and Moda and Andover and Thimbleberries, Buggy Barn and Maywood and Makower....creams, beiges (I'm partial to those that complement the darker tones! :-D), whites....You just can't have too many good backgrounds.  But nothing that really "spoke" to me for Roseville.

I ended up buying a Moda piece from the Bliss line  (it's second from the left in the photo) -- similar to Kim's recommended "dotty" background fabrics, just a bit subtler with a light creamy white dot on a creamy background.

I didn't even blink when I bought the required 9+ yards -- it seems I buy background fabric in bulk! LOL  Most of the pieces I have in my stash are a minimum of 3 yards, and some are even more, upwards of 6 to 8 yards, with whole bolts of Kona cottons in cream, bone, snow, khaki and white!

In most of my quilts, even the scrappiest, I notice that I often use the same background throughout to "unify" the piece.

I think that's why I like investing in good backgrounds.  The quilts I make "feel" better to me if they are unified with some element throughout -- theme or color or background.  Background gives me more options; I don't have to have a "matchy-matchy" quilt if the background pulls the design together around my other color choices.

And now that I'm applique crazy....well, good backgrounds are the framework for all the intricate design and work of beautiful flowers, stars, vines, folk-art, etc., that make up my current projects.

I'd like to think that my life is like that, too.  That there is a "framework" for all the details of my existence, some unifying element that binds it all, that coheres the varying pieces of Mary Lou.

The apostle Paul wrote about such a framework to the church at Colosse.  It was a time of economic crisis, immorality, and false teaching (does that sound at all familiar... like anything we've been experiencing in our time and in our country?), and Paul told them that there is One who holds it all together:

"He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation.  For by him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together." (Colossians 1:15-17, emphasis, mine :-)

With Christ as my Cohere-er :-), I don't have to worry about holding it all together myself.  With Him as my framework, I can bring all the disjointed pieces -- scraps, many of them, some that others might even throw away! -- and present a beautiful Quilt that glorifies the One who created all things, including me and you, and blesses those who touch it, day in and day out.

So no fabric buying for a while.  I think I'll see what One can do with the pieces that I have!

Blessings!