Mystery Quilt

Today my oldest sister has the day off, so I'm driving to Columbus to spend the day with her visiting and shipping for fabric for a Mystery Quilt.

What's a Mystery Quilt??? It all starts with a Host who announces that they will be offering a Mystery Quilt. The only information you get is the finished size of the quilt, the fabric requirements you will need to complete the project, and the duration. The Mystery Quilt I am doing this year will be over 8 weeks so each week for approx. 8 weeks a new clue will come out and tell us what to sew that week. We won't know what the quilt will look like until almost the end. Each week we will just be sewing pieces and parts to blocks that will then be assembled at the end. Its a huge leap of faith but one that is exciting....to ME! The first clue comes out the day after Thanksgiving.

The Mystery Quilt by Bonnie Hunter (she has the blog Quiltville) is called Celtic Solstice. Below are some of the fabrics for the quilt, however I need a lot more. Bonnie's quilts are scrappy. Her patterns are great to use up your stash but I just need to fill in a little here and there. The quilt top will be a King size 111"x 111". Scrap quilts take more fabric than you will use but the more the better. This quilt calls for a total of 20 yards just for the front of the quilt. That's just CRAZY, but fun!!!!

I will be honest and say I am not in love with the colors of this quilt. Its very primary and I am so not. So why make a quilt when you don't know if you will even like it? Because I will like it. I will love it. It will push me to get out of my box and be creative yet in a safe way. Someone else if pulling the stings telling me its okay, it will be fine. They already took the risk and this is a person I trust. A mystery quilt is like a painting class from a respected artist. What do I have to lose. Since I am using mostly fabric that I have already purchased and just adding in where I am short...like the orange and neutrals, the cost will be minimal in the grand scheme of things. This is a KING size quilt so its not cheap to make. Its an investment but it will fulfill one of my goals for getting 2 king size quilts done this year. Also, this quilt will take me a few months to complete. What would you pay for a few months of art classes 3 days a week (how long it takes me to get one clue finished)?

Last year was my first year to join Bonnie's Mystery Quilt. I truly enjoyed it and was so very very happy with the way it turned out. I still need to quilt it but hope to get some backing that I like while I am out today with my sister. This quilt is called Easy Street. It is 84"x 84". It called for just over 15 yards of fabric to get all the different variations in colors.