Fans RR2 and tip for the day

 This is my progress so far on Judy's fan block..  Her center fan section has silver in it... I seldom get to use silver so I had lots of silver treasures to use...  As you can see I stuck to her colors of blue and white... You can never go wrong building on the colors already in a block.












But at this point I want to introduce another color and it will probably be pink or yellow...

Judy said she'd like a spider web and I can do that at the bottom and although she didn't ask for a bird, I can never resist adding one.

Tip for the day:  So you have to do a seam on a very busy pattern and you know it will just disappear.  Well this is the perfect time to stack chain stitches together..2 or more layers. They will hold their own against any pattern..... I guarantee it.

No rule says you can't add to hankies...

This will be the last hanky post for a bit... It's too large to tote with me and I want to use the little time I have at home to do the finishing touches on the suffrage quilt.  But as I have stated before I'm trying to add more blues to this piece to offset the reds... One of the best places is right on the hankies themselves and there is no rule that says one can't add embellishments to hankies... 

Here I have added DMC flowers just below the roses to the hanky on the left and blue silk ribbon knots to the hanky on the right... I will add more blue to other hankies as well...

There are quite a few opportunities for fancy seam treatments...some of those on hankies as well..

Making progress

 
Looking to reduce the red I removed the red cording and replaced it with more lace (upper right) and the new hanky arrived with a much better rose motif and I replaced it lower right... No more plans to change any of the reds.... just add more blues now...

The first two birds have been attached and stuffed.

Problem solving on hanky quilt....

 
 

I knew from the very beginning that I needed a LOT of blue to compensate for the power of the red and I am a long way from that point yet...

Right now the red and blue have about equal weight.





I will have a lot more blue when all the birds are on and when the beading is done but the rose lower right is just too large.  If I remove it all together it leaves the block unbalanced.  So I ordered another hanky with a smaller rose to replace it.

Today Tip:  You will find often you need to butt hankies up against each other like the two on the left..  The color, fabric and textures of the two are not the least compatible.

To make this pairing work you need to have a rather dramatic transition different in color and texture of the two hankies..  In this case I did a series of scallops in variegated blue French knots which solved the problem quite nicely...