Bubblegum pink woodwork

Although I'm not scaling peaks like some people I know, I do seem to have crawled out of the creative valley that was my August and have been busy, busy this week with several new projects.  The sun finally broke through today, after a dark and dreary week, and I got some better shots up in the sewing room this afternoon.

A few people were wondering about the patchwork post from earlier in the week.  How big are the blocks, what's it going to be, why are you starting a new quilt just minutes after you said your focus this fall was going to be quilting up a pile of waiting-to-be-finished tops?  The blocks are 8" (finished), it's going to be a queen sized quilt (11x11 blocks) and the last one...that's a little more complicated.

 

I don't have a quilt for my bed.  I started this one and though I love it, I could quickly see it was too dark for my bedroom.  With that in mind, I bought these (remember?) and spent many hours musing over possibilities.  I started the hexagon quilt, but that is/was never going to be bed-sized.  So what finally got me moving on my bed quilt? 

Hey, I like lots of colors, too.  Really!  (Click)

Last week, while M was painting our bedroom a lovely, warm, Dover white (my favorite neutral,) a recent article from the Cleveland newspaper was on my mind.  Mailed to me by a friend, I was going to link it here, but I see it's no longer posted online.  Briefly, it was a home section feature on a woman and her colorful house.  Some excerpts:

• The dining room really is painted red above the purple chair rail and apple green below.
• The kitchen cupboards are French blue, the walls lilac and the baseboard lime green.

      
        Scanned from article

• An aqua green staircase leads to [her daughter's) third-floor bedroom suite, where she chose peach walls with tangerine woodwork. Her bathroom, including the claw-foot bathtub, is sea green.
• Perhaps you'd like to guess what colors this intrepid homeowner chose for her own bedroom. Here's a clue. When her 22-year-old son first saw the room, he said, "You know, Mom, this is where testosterone goes to die."   You are correct! The walls are purple and the woodwork is bubble gum pink.

And the kicker:

• When she moved into her 85-year-old home a year ago, the walls were a sea of cream, both upstairs and down. Realtors call this "move-in ready," but the petite mother of three called it boring.

Wrong.  It wasn't a sea of cream, it was lovely, warm, Dover white.  That was my old house!  You might assume I was horrified, but actually my reaction was mixed.  I liked a couple of the photos that accompanied the article (not the kitchen) and I love that she was so bold in her approach.  I do cringe at the lack of *color flow* from room to room and I can't say I can even imagine my former bedroom in purple and bubblegum pink. (Gah!)  However, I am in awe that she did the whole house...basement to third floor!...in such a short time.  While I sat here in the new place, pondering quilt patterns.  Sheesh. 

The forecast is for a sunny weekend so I plan to get some mums planted and snap some photos of my other projects before the clouds roll in again.  With luck, more frequent posts next week.  One more thing before I finish.  Have you been reading Kelli's posts of her recent adventures as a public health practitioner in South America?  They all make for fascinating reading but yesterday's humorous post about her visit to a women's cooperative, Bolivian Barbie,the Collector's Edition, is not to be missed.  (Textile content!)  And that title just cracks me up.    

Comments

[Kelli]

You are so sweet. Thank you Jan!

[Kate]

Ack! I always like to think houses I've left behind are just as I last saw them...It sounds like you are dealing with this better than I would, but my heart goes out to you nonetheless!

[susan@artstream]

oh jan, that is an awful feeling!i drove by my old house and saw tey ripped out my rose garden which took 15 years to create along with the herb garden and planted ... grass.
dover white sounds lovely to me, especially with all your creative color bounding about.
sigh.

[Cordelia]

Okay, I see susan's point, but it's pretty funny they wrote about *your* house in the paper!

Do you know/remember the book "Forever" by Judy Blume? The heroine describes the walls & furniture in her home as something deliberately equivalent to plain/boring so as to be a background to her family's plants and her younger sister's artwork. You have your color in your art, not on the walls!

[Emily]

I have a checkerboard bed quilt in my near future too! For the same reason--ever since we bought a king size bed (five-six years ago) we haven't had a quilt just right for the bed. Mine is going to be blue and white. Love yours.

[Tonya R]

That triangle quilt is gorgeous, but have to agree it is dark. The new project is light colorful fun and gorgeous - it will look smashing on your bed. I too ama believer in white walls - makes all the artwork and quilts pop. The couple who bought our house were excited because we'd already done all the hardwork of taking out the wallpaper and the white walls were going to be a perfect base for faux painting of some variety.

[Lily]

Oh my goodness Jan! Fancy seeing your old house done up or is that over in a magazine!!!

Love how that quilt is coming along - it's great.

[Kellie]

Loving the bed quilt - fabulous colours! think you are doing great re. the house 'makeover', lol! I nearly cried when i saw (like Susan) that our new owners had ripped out the rose garden - thank goodness we had taken cuttings because every rose had a special meaning. And they hated the new paint work that I adored (and carefully chose to enhance the character features!) - goodness only knows what it looks like inside! Anyway - delurking to say 'I feel your pain'!!

[Carole]

That sort of thing would blow me away. We painted our old house yellow. It was a beautiful sunny yellow with white trim and green shutters. Classic. The new owners changed the yellow to a dreary charcoal grey. Sheesh.

[Katjaquilt]

The quilt looks cool. It somehow reminds me on Kaffe Fassett.

[Leslie]

I love all the colors in your quilt! But it does seem the new owner of your home has gone a bit overboard. I guess that's what makes a house truly "home" for each of us...making it suit our own personalities!

You asked about my sock pattern--it's just a simple two-row repeat. Knit one row, then K3, P1 on the next round. Easy! I like my socks simple so I don't have to think too much.

[Judy]

Well, I guess I am in the minority here as I love to paint every room in the house and I do it rather quickly. Paint is great because if you don't like it, you can easily change it the next day...all you invest is very little money and your time! And I love to paint!

Now I agree that flow is good, but sometimes a door is all I need to seperate my colors! I'll tell you that in the 3 days before we moved in we painted about half the rooms, which is much easier before all the furniture comes in! I'll share my colors...brace yourself! My small condo is open, the entry is 3 x 3 feet and the three walls are med/dark purple. The den is a mocha latte color, moving to the light/med olive on the kitchen walls and the three diningroom walls are one shade darker olive. BUT in my defense, all my stuff is either beige, green or purple. Couch is mocha with purple pillows, the chair a mix of purple and green. The dinging room curtains are dark purple satin. The hall is mocha, moving to my light lav/purple bedroom and bathroom. So it's all the same color and flow. EXCEPT that the guest bath is chocolate brown, my sewing room is a beautiful aqua color called "Slash", and my laundry room is Apple green. Laundry isn't fun, I need bright colors!

Now feel free to go and barf!

[Chris]

I love the colors on your bed quilt. Since it's fall, you definitely need one. :)

How odd to see pictures of your old home in the paper, so very changed!

[graylagran]

the colors, the colors, the colors! oh, it just makes me wish i could just dip into your stash! ... or pay you enough compliments to make you gift a finished quilt to me! (i can dream, can't i?)
i'm happy you're back in the saddle, as it means there will be more pictures for me to drool over!

[weirdbunny]

I've put your blog on my side bar, hop that's ok?

[Amy]

The quilt is ga-ga gorgeous. I love the colors, fabrics and you've combined them skillfully.

I can't imagine seeing pics of my old house with new decorating scheme from new owners. What a shock!

[Scribbles & Bits]

The quilt looks amazing! And I think neutral walls are good! I like spicing the place up with colorful accessories. Not to say that I don't dream of painting my dining room a hunter green and my living room a deep Victorian raspberry, but I rent, so colorful, easy-to-remove accessories it is!

[Wendi]

I'd have a conniption!
I like color, but not THAT MUCH color!

[myra]

Oh my gosh, what a great story!

Love the quilt! Now that's the way to combine color!

[Kay]

A painful story. The people who bought our old house painted it yellow (that's OK), but then they ripped out all the shrubbery and put a cement slab all around the house. I wanted to cry. Love the quilt!

[Lauri]

Just found your blog and oh my gosh I could not love that checkerboard quilt more! Those colors are absolutely BEAUTIFUL!

[kathy]

Your story gave me a great laugh. I did not predict where it was going so what a funny finish. I'm glad to see you taking it in good humor, not sure I would. I love the quilt progress. It's going to be a beautiful garden of color. Can't wait to see it completed.