Cozy Couch Quilts

Recently my Mom handed me the pieces, rows, and the book for this quilt she had been working on. It is from the Sandy Thompson book Quick Cozy Couch Quilts, 2008. I followed the assembly directions and boy, sorry don't read this Mom, I really was not in love with this quilt. The big blocks of plain fabric were really jumping out. What I finally realized when I got to the quilting was this isn't a quilt about the piecing - it is a quilt about the quilting. Specifically in those blocks that were just big blocks of nothing. So, I started digging for ideas through my growing library of quilting idea books. I took inspiration from a number of places; changed things to roses and with Mom's approval got started. Unsewing the very first thing I sewed really set the tone for this project! Phone at the ready with the pictures of the motifs and the mini projection unit set up on a tripod I set to drawing. I decided that I was going to use the air erasable pen so I didn't have to go back and erase or wet down the quilt. This meant I could only draw about 4 designs (blocks) and then sew to ensure I wasn't redrawing. But, when it came to the big blue blocks I am having trouble. I really didn’t want to do the tissue paper method and have to pick all the little pieces out. The air erasable pens almost instantly evaporate on this shiny fabric she used. My white chalk pencil doesn't show up everywhere and a combination of colors meant my eyes where jumping and had trouble following. What seems to work the best is the yellow chalk and then quilting with the printout right beside me so if I get lost I can refer to it. Or, I just make it up until I get back to where I know I am. Which means the large continuous line roses might be interesting! But who will know since they are hard to see. I did resort to the tissue patterns for the border. It was going to just be too hard to draw those.