207

I can hardly believe how many hexagons I've finished over the past couple of weeks! 207 of them, to be exact. I wanted to try this to see if it was something I would want to do, and then planned to set it aside while I worked on baby stuff. But it's such an easy, portable hand sewing project, that I've picked it up almost every evening while visiting with the family. And just look how far I've gotten without really trying to work on it ... and in the midst of all the other projects I've had going.

Don't you love that hexagon with the heart flower centered on it? That was completely unplanned. I cut all my fabric in the most economical way, without looking patterns or doing any fussy cutting, and this is just how it turned out - and, it was the first one of that fabric I stitched - FUN. For now, I'm storing them in a quart-sized zip-lock bag. Lazy pictures. I didn't want to have to re-stack them and squeeze them all into the bag again. I'm going to have to find a box. They are stuffed in there pretty tight.

I didn't really have a plan for how big this would become. Originally, I figured that if I wasn't thrilled with doing the project, I would just make a wall-hanging for my sewing room. I plan to paint the sewing room turquoise and use red and white accents for the room (when the house eventually gets here). But since I'm finding that I LOVE doing these, I've talked myself into making a king-sized quilt for our room - which we already have paint for - in a deep, royal blue (with a plan for white wainscoting around the bottom). My 18 year old was concerned that the room would be too "red-white-and-blue" but I think the turquoise shade and the lack of any stars and stripes will keep it from doing that.

I know this will be a long-range project. If I were doing the wall hanging, I would be about 30% done, but for a king, I'm only just over 5% of the way. It's the difference between needing 711 hexagons for the wall quilt or 3,899 for the king ;) (Believe it or not, this is good news. I was thinking I was needing close to 5,000 until I looked this up again, so it's a great relief that I was wrong - tee hee.) I figure if I get stalled out along the way, I can always just make whatever size I have enough hexagons for.

For now, I have decided to set it aside ... at least until after the quilt shop hop at the end of April/beginning of May. I only have 600 papers, so I need to start hooking some of these together so I can remove and reuse the papers. Before I do that, I want to get a few more fabrics so it won't be like there is one section with one kind of fabrics and another section with completely different fabrics. My plan is to try to buy at least one fat quarter from each store I visit on the shop hop. I like to support the stores while going around to collect the stamps for my "passport," and fat quarters are very affordable.

I'm really looking forward to this year's shop hop. I didn't get to go last year because we went to Fort Collins, Colorado to visit family instead, so last time I did this was two years ago. I took my two year old with me (he was about 6 months old at the time and I was still nursing.) This time, I get to take my 18 year old daughter along, and she's actually looking forward to it. She wants to get fabrics (!) to make more of her flower headbands. We should have a really fun time - especially without the little ones to worry about loading and unloading at all 12 shops. It's hard enough to make the circuit in one day without trying to get little ones to cooperate. We have to do it in one day because we're clear at the end of the line for the stores. We have one shop in town, (which we will probably visit sometime before we do the rest), but the next nearest is a 77 mile drive, then the rest are over Teton Pass and into Idaho. We'll try to be at the next nearest store right at opening time so we'll have the whole day. It's challenging, but SO fun. It would also be a little hard to justify the expense of it if it didn't always fall on my birthday. But it has become a part of my birthday gift, so it makes a little more sense. We will be taking the economical car though - more money to spend on fabric that way *wink*.