Jeana’s Journal

This week, with St. Patrick’s Day on the calendar, seems like a good time to talk about one of my two favorite colors: Green.

But first, a little detour: If you want to know what your favorite and least favorite colors are, arrange your fabric all together by color and it will tell you.

I have been collecting quilting fabric for about 30 years now. Over the years I have found that grouping fabric together by color is the most efficient way for me to use it. I have refined (weeded out) my collection several times (moving is a great incentive) and still the proportions of “keeper” fabric stays the same: No. 1 is green, No. 2 is red.

Much of my design work is applique and in that medium red and green do dominate, so it seems logical that I would collect those colors.

However, a peek inside my closet reveals a dominance of those same two colors. Almost weekly one batch of sorted laundry that I wash is red—-only.

Also, my kitchen cabinets, chosen by me alone, are guess what colors? Red and green. In my mind, it is an everlastingly beautiful color combination.

We have a natural born instinct to purchase fabric for our quilting in the colors, and different shades of those colors, that we wear well, i.e. colors that look good on us. We also like to live with these colors around us and decorate our homes accordingly.

I cannot tell you how many times, as a teacher, I have stood before a class who is ready to begin work and who have their fabric stacked neatly beside them on the table. Almost without exception, I see students sitting expectantly at tables wearing clothing in colors that coordinate perfectly with the fabric they have chosen for the day’s work.

I don’t believe the students planned it that way, it is instinctual. We choose fabric for quilting in colors that we wear well.

Check your closet and your fabric stash to see if my theory holds out for you.

But back to today’s subject: Green. The word green is closely related to the Old English verb growan, “to grow”. All of the plant world begins with this color and it is synonymous with life.

I see green as a neutral against which all other colors are enhanced. Perhaps that is why green is the largest collection in my fabric cabinets.

Visual dimension is achieved by simply using a variety of contrasting greens from dark to light in different shades or hues.

It is a hard working color and rarely disappoints in bringing life, dimension and, sometimes, pizzaz to all of the other colors in my fabric palette.

Case in point, here is a sneak peak at an upcoming design. Publication schedule: Christmas quilt first, this nine-block album quilt to follow…..