Mock Jingle Layout With Setting Triangles

Planned Layout for my Jingle Quilt

I need EQ7 software.  I just spent the last two hours here at the computer, trying to rearrange little thumbnail pictures of my Jingle blocks in a Word document because I don't have quilt design software.  It turns out that Microsoft Word is not an ideal software package for graphic design.  It was a glorious pain, but in the end I made it work.  What you see above (click the photo to enlarge it, so you can see the whole thing) is Erin Russek's design image for this BOM, with my own quilt blocks and red setting triangles superimposed in the arrangement that feels most balanced to me.  Then I plopped the image from the center medallion pattern in the center to see what it would look like in a straight setting.  Anyway, here's what I decided:

1.  My existing blocks are fine, and I don't need to swap out any more pieced blocks.  Once the blocks are surrounded by the red poinsettia fabric of the setting triangles, they blend together much better than they do when I look at them against the off white backdrop of my design wall.
2. I want to set my center applique medallion straight rather than an point.  I really hated the idea of giant green setting triangles around the center medallion, for one thing, and I really want to do some pieced borders with these blocks without the quilt growing to an unmanageable size.  Setting the center medallion straight should give me about 5 1/2" between the medallion and the other blocks, enough for several smaller pieced borders, and I can also do multiple pieced and plain borders in place of the wide green outer border as well.

Here is how Erin's pattern calls for the blocks to be set:

Original Pattern Designer's Layout

I think this looks great with Erin's fabric choices, but I just have not been able to find a green print fabric that I like well enough between the blocks and the medallion, and when I scroll through my Pinterest boards, I find that the sampler quilts that catch my eye again and again seem to be the ones with multiple pieced and plain borders that are scaled smaller than the blocks they frame.  Do I have the skills to get all of these borders to lay nice and flat and fit together properly?  Well, that remains to be seen.  This whole project has been a learning experience, just like every other project has been, come to think of it.  I think the pieced borders will be worth it even if I struggle with them, because I used a LOT of different fabrics in this quilt and mixing those up in pieced borders will help to tie it all together and unify the finished quilt much better than gigantic pieces of fabrics could possibly do, regardless of whether I used green solid fabric or a green print. 


Meanwhile, I'm still working on the applique hand work for the center medallion and I do have a ways to go with that.  I'm probably a good two weeks out from finishing, since I only work on it for 30 minutes to an hour each day.   Stay tuned...  :-)