You know how much fun it is to arrange blocks to the best advantage, especially when they are a bit scrappy? Well, yesterday I was quilting at my local seniors' centre, busy machine quilting off to one side of the room, when the activity at the tables in the center attracted my attention. There were four women gathered around the table, trying to find the best layout for some slightly scrappy blocks that would not put large chunks of the same fabric next to each other. It was lots of fun to watch, as they turned, swapped, and re- arranged those blocks, again and again. One person would move a block to a new location, and another would point out that now a new colour was clumped, and a third would move another block, and they would all start flipping and swapping again. They finally got a set-up that satisfied them, carefully piled the blocks in rows and went off to three different machines to put the rows together. However, no-one kept track of where the rows went in relation to each other! So then they had to meet back at the tables and start to try and place the rows in the right order. Of course, no arrangement of the rows would recreate the satisfying order they had before, even though they 'knew' that the blocks had been put in the rows the right way. After a good five minutes of frustration, they decided that 'good enough' would have to do, and away the rows went to be sewn together. I'm glad that I was too busy on the machine to be drawn into that committee meeting! But it was fun to watch.
- posted
14 years ago