serendipitous piles

 

another online fabric order of fabrics i randomly picked from one shop on etsy that, when arrived, strikes me as a great fabric combination for a quilt.

i love this grouping so much! i think this spontaneous syncopation happens because when i'm scanning a shop for any other items they carry that i might like, i often have certain projects in mind or specific types of fabrics i'm looking for.

backup a bit - i usually find myself shopping for fabric online when i'm on the hunt for a specific fabric i want. either i've seen it somewhere or i need to restock something i didn't have enough of/want more of. i go to etsy and search the desired fabric. when i find it, i also scan the shop for more items i might like because i'm going to be paying shipping as it is and i might as well get a little more fabric in that envelope, right?

so when i'm in this situation, the fabrics i select are going to be influenced by what the shop has to offer/their style, and any projects i might have in mind at the time. also, i am always on the lookout for good low-volume finds and basics/blenders.

considering these factors, i guess it's not really a surprise that the resulting bundle often goes together well. it's happened to me several times. sometimes i have to edit out one or two of the fabrics or add more in if the pattern calls for more, but in general it's really fun to come up with an idea for a seemingly random pile of fabrics that happen to look great together.

i've made a number of quilts from piles of fabric gathered in this way, more than i realized:

this pile of fabrics i purchased from anna maria horner's nashville shop, craft south, on a visit there the weekend she opened the store became a single block, improv log cabin. i was just picking things i liked when shopping at the store. it wasn't until much later at home that i considered that they actually looked good together.

"twelve south" is still in the "to be quilted" queue

this pile of heather ross fabrics was sitting on my pressing table for a long time. i don't remember how it got there, if it came together from a single order (very likely) or if i put the heather rosses from one r a couple order(s) together with the intention of filing them away later. either way, i kept looking at it until i decided to just make a quilt from it.

this is another log cabin quilt (i definitely had my log cabin era), still in the piecing phase.

this golden book-looking pile was a big online order that said, "pretty please keep us together!"

on mother's day weekend 2021 i made them into an aunt bet's by frankie and ray.

in early 2020, i put in an order to fat quarter shop for some yardage of these various solids. the box arrived at my house just as the world shut down and the pandemic kicked off. 

i hadn't ordered these for a particular quilt, just to stock up on some colors i was interested in. but i quickly decided they would be made together in a commemorative quilt, a house quilt i call "shelter in place," to mark the difficult but beautiful time our family spent together in quarantine. i'm still working on this one.

i saw someone else's all-solids christmas tree quilt and decided to use these same fabrics (i had plenty) to make a merry and bright christmas quilt i call "bright forest." status - still piecing.

maybe you recognize this pile from another online order because it recently became a finish. i took out two of these prints (so glad i took out the green sprig print!) and supplemented with a couple more.

i've come to really love "fall paint lake," which now mostly reminds me of our time in malibu while my son was getting medical help in LA. i think of it as our beach house quilt, not a lake quilt. i have no idea where the pattern designer came up with that name. but i can't rename it now. or can i? it still isn't labeled.

that's a look at piles becoming quilts. what should i do with my new pile?