Scrappy Trip around the World

Last Friday, when it seemed like everyone else has returned from making their Scrappy Trip around the World quilts and were now staying at home to begin a Marcelle Medallion,  I finally packed my rucksack and embarked on a solo, unfashionably-late trip around the world of my own. I can now see why so many people have made a bee-line for this pattern - it's totally addictive and the end result is stunning...and you really can put it together with scraps, without too much thought about a colour scheme. 

There has been so little sewing going on in my house recently that by last Friday I felt there was an actual need to sew in order for me to be a normal person over the weekend. The moment I began to get my boxes of material out and had constructed a nest around me, that only a mess of fabric seems capable of creating in just the right way, I began to feel my equilibrium return. 

The purpose of my sewing was a dog bed for Nell as she has nearly outgrown the one that Polly gave us for her. It may seem indulgent to give a dog your best Liberty fabric or to spend quite so many hours of your time piecing together something involving 1" squares (I reduced the scale of the pattern, as only fiddly would do that day), but this had very little to do with Nell or what the end product was to be, and everything to do with me having a need to sew with some Tana lawn and to work on something absorbing. 

It was so gloomy outside that to be inside with the lights on was thoroughly cosy. I listened to The Lumineers on repeat (does anyone else love The Lumineers - can you recommend anything similar I might like so that I can alternate them with something else?), cut fabric, sewed strips, cut more fabric, laid strips out ready to be sewn, and then lined up seams in a repetitive whirl of happiness. 

Until finally I had some finished blocks. 

This pattern only comes to life once you start placing the blocks next to one another. The blocks can be put together in a myriad of different ways - below are just two of the combinations I played around with. 

And here they are once they're sewn together. 

The overall colour is insanely intense and I love it. Despite the fact that little Nell is currently like a small feral wolf who will not appreciate either, I decided that the possibility of combining the Tana lawn with some Oakshott was too irresistible to leave untried. Before you despair at this level of impracticality, I think I completely solved all of those issues with the way I quilted it, but that's for another post. 

Mid-construction, here's a photo of our beautiful tabby appreciating Liberty and Oakshott in a quiet, reserved and respectful way. I finally finished the bed today and Nell's reaction was slightly less like a patron in a gallery and more like...well a wild dog in a dog bed. It was highly amusing and she never fails to shock me with quite how un-cat-like she is. But I'd been bracing myself for that - as I said earlier in my post, making this wasn't about the end result, it was all about enjoying the process. 

Wishing you a lovely weekend, 

Florence x