Chocolate Swirl

Sunday was a fruitful day indeed.
Let’s go back to Saturday, okay let’s go back a bit further.

After making @play I knew I wanted to make another quilt loosely based on that design.  It’s been on the inspiration wall for quite a while and this chocolate-brown Radiance in my fabric stash about that long. Saturday afternoon I made it into the studio taped two sheets of paper together to create about the size quilt I’m going for and started to draw/think.
A couple of different facebook friends asked what do I mark with and why. When I do mark a quilt top I tend to prefer Generals Chalk Pencils or Pounce if I’m using templates. I like that the markings will either come off as I’m stitching or with a damp cloth later on.
After about 30 minutes I moved over to the fabric drew the bones and stopped to make some further decisions: batting, how many layers of batting, backing, thread.
I opened the cabinet with the batting to see what I have that is kind of flat. Bamboo, perfect. Opened it up to let it relax over night. I decided to use 2 layers as I like the look and feel.
Stonehenge by Northcott is the back, I’ll show that another time. While I was spray basting the first time the adhesive was gathering like snot and sneezed on the Radiance. That one was removed and set aside. I can’t bear to toss it…yet. Back to the drawing on the Radiance resulting in the photo on the right.
When I marked the bones of @play I placed the Radiance over the drawing I’d made, for this I chose a spot to be the visual center, placed a dot there and drew in the spirals freehand. Once I knew where the spirals were I chose the ones that would have flying geese and drew in the lines – again freehand. I have practiced drawing straight lines enough that I’m comfortable drawing them in without a ruler. Well, at least within the short distance of the spirals. When I got to the grid (seen in the first picture) I marked that with my omni-grid ruler.
Someone else asked if I stitch around the perimeter of the quilt before starting the quilting. No I don’t. Particularly on a whole cloth, I’m concerned that the quilt will grow and there’s nowhere to go with the fabric.
Do I plan motifs before I quilt? As a general rule, no, I don’t. I didn’t even plan that two sets of geese would be flying in the same direction the first from the lower right to the upper left; the second from the upper left to the upper right. I’m noticing this as I type. I have no idea what will come next.

Happy Quilting!
Teri