I don't think I do anything unusual?

I often receive comments about the choices of fabric I have made, particularly in my applique blocks.  Do I have a secret?  No, I just love fabric and always attempt to add as many different fabrics as humanly possible.  I feel like there is no perfect colour - but there are ten or so pretty good colours that will do the trick, and all of them look pretty good together.  This is my technique in a nutshell.

My Tweets quilt started life as a selection of Japanese Taupe fabrics - some from being a member of a monthly club - some I just liked, and some fabrics that I thought just played nicely with the others.  So no, they are not all part of the same collection.  They all got happily jammed together in an old shoe box.

I then selected a bunch of fat quarters that I wanted to use as backgrounds which also included quite a mixture - from some quite light ones, to some darker plaids, a stripe and a few in-betweens.

These are the ones I have left - two creams, another plaid, and two mid value.  I don't think that adds up to twelve... but that's OK - I can choose some more when I run out.

Once I've decided which background I am going to work with this time, I start pulling fabric combinations from my "box of tricks", making piles of fabrics that I want to use for particular areas, in this block the bird/feathers are in the bottom left (sort of placed to represent how they will appear), a selection of leaf fabrics in the top left, my choice for the flowers/centres top right, and the start of a pile for the second bird in the bottom right.  I look to get a good contrast between the background and the applique pieces, and try to achieve some differentiation between the various elements.

This block is quite different with the darker background so I chose a few lighter fabrics for the flowers and feathers.  These fabrics would have blended too much with the lighter backgrounds if I'd used them in the other blocks.  I'm quite happy with how this one turned out... although the blanket stitch will help to further define the petals in the flower as each petal is a separate piece.

And how it's all starting to look together...

Oh dear, just another eight blocks and a full on applique border to do... one step at a time!! I am amazed at the difference adding this fourth block has made... it has all started to make sense from a visual point of view.

How do you approach projects?