The Center part is complete. When I first showed the completed top to my husband in the spring, he suggested I do pebble work in the red boxes like I had tried out on another project. At that time I decided to go a different path and do a general stitch over the whole quilt, which then took me almost 3 months to finish ripping the stupid stitches out of that disaster. It seemed like a good idea to consider his suggestion this time around though.
I am going to say something though, I really dislike the Aurifil thread for this project, which I know admitting aloud is going against practically the whole quilting community, but I feel I can't keep quiet just because everyone else is in love with the item. I was very surprised to find that I actually prefer the inexpensive threads I have bought from Connecting Threads in the past! Their colors are more vibrant; they simply feels and look better in my opinion than Aurifil. Hey, nobody is more surprised than me at my thoughts. Yes, I agree that because the weight is lighter I can fit more thread on bobbins but for the stone work I did I felt like I had to use twice as much thread to get it to contrast even close to what I liked. For example, in this project I had to go around 3-5 times for each pebble to get the vibrancy of just 1-2 stone-turns with my usual thread. So in this case I felt like I had to do a lot more work than I expected.
I know, there will be some of you out there who will urge me to keep trying it out, perhaps change weights or try different stitches. I do plan to try out a simpler stitch with the white Aurfil thread on another project just so you know that ahead of time. I also have heard people rave the use of the lighter weight Aurifil thread in piecing, so I will try that as well. I just have to say though, so far, I am not impressed.
*\o/* Cheers
Shanna
