Recently I was in between bigger, more complicated projects and sort of at loose ends, and I was feeling the itch to cut and sew something -- anything -- without thinking about it too much. Just mindless making. So I went to my stash and pulled out a 10" layer cake of Carolyn Friedlander's Gleaned fabric in the blue/gray/black/white colorway and quickly came up with a plan.
I cut some of the blocks in half and started alternating them on my design wall. But keeping some blocks at 10" square didn't look right, so I just cut everything in half and this Layer Bars quilt was born. I added a couple of other Carolyn Friedlander pieces I had in my stash to fill in a few of the gaps, but otherwise this came from one stack.
I pieced the top quickly and put it in the closet to be finished later for donation to Project Linus. Then I was contacted by an event planner looking for a quilter to set up at a United Way donor event. I agreed to attend as a representative of the Knoxville Modern Quilt Guild, displaying both guild quilts and some of my own.
She said there would be a silent auction with items from the other artists attending -- a painter, a potter and a stained glass maker -- and asked if I'd consider adding something. After I joked that, well, quilts don't come together overnight or even over a couple of days (at least they don't for me), I remembered that I had Layer Bars in the closet.
I used part of a new black and white gingham bedsheet (also from my stash) for the backing to keep the lap quilt neutral and hopefully more appealing to more event attendees. I quilted it with straight lines to match the clean, linear piecing.
The quilt got a lot of compliments at the event, and one attendee even put in his bid and then came back later to add another one -- I hope he went home with it. I left the event before the silent auction was officially closed, but the bidding was at $300 when last I checked. I haven't received word of the final amount, but I'm glad I was able to contribute to the local United Way's efforts. If I hadn't already had the quilt top waiting in the wings, I'm not sure I could have pulled a quilt together in time.