That is what I had to do to unearth all of the pieces of what was originally going to be my 2015 state fair piece, but which then became my anticipated 2016 state fair piece, and what is now destined to be my 2017 state fair piece.

I say destined, because I am finally at that point in the process where there is nothing left to be done but to finish it, take it to the fair, await the judge’s decision, pick it up from the fair, and then put it put it away with all of the other things I have made that are too good to use (you can check out a post on that topic here).

One thing I could see after I laid out all the pieces in the late afternoon light of this waning day of summer is that the overall feel of the piece is moodier than I want the finished piece to be:

Fortunately, I haven’t finished crocheting or embroidering all of the crazy quilt pieces, so without covering territory I’ve already gone over, I have the chance (and, more importantly, the time) to bring in colors that will lift the overall mood of the piece, and breath a little more light into it.

The eight outer panels of the afghan have already been bordered with Vanna’s Choice toffee border:

Which has quieted the overall feel, which is compounded when all of the pieces are laid out together:

In the late light of a summer day, it looks to me as if I need to make the remainder of the pieces from the lighter colors I have used throughout the rest of the piece, including more gold, more bright orchid, more guava, and perhaps some flamingo.

I can also see that I need to be more bold in my color choices for the embroidery because what looks good when viewed up close can be almost invisible when viewed at a distance, and the whole point of this project is to bring my grandmother life out of the shadows, and let her tell her story, and to do that, I am going to have to continue to dig deep.

Related posts: Too good to use