Parisian Summer Blooms

 I often struggle with naming quilts. It's hard enough to come up with a name that suits the quilt, and then I worry I'll feel self conscious if someone looks at the label and notices the name, and then thinks it's silly.

I shouldn't care so much about what other people think of me. If I like the name, that's all that matters, right? But I do care. I think it's human nature and it takes a lot of discipline and confidence to not care too much. We should care at least a little, I think, otherwise, we'd be psychopaths. But not too much.

I fretted as I named this quilt. It is a pattern from Angela Pingel's excellent book, A Quilter's Mixology, which I love. I've made several quilts from this book, and it's one I keep returning to. She has excellent instructions for piecing curves and interesting modern designs. This pattern has been on my list for a while. In the book, the name is simply Curved Nine Patch. Simple. Descriptive. No frills. 

But I think it lacks personality, too. Which is fine, because then a maker doesn't need to feel influenced by the name when they're naming their own quilt. 

In the end, I named it Parisian Summer Blooms. The curves form flower blocks together, the colors seem summery to me with bold bright colors leaning into autumn, and there are a few Paris themed prints. I'm not sure it has the right feel, but I think it works. 

This quilt was quick to put together, which is always nice. It did take some thinking during assembly, and I didn't have quite the variety of fabrics that maybe would have made that easier. I tried hard to not have the same fabric in the same groupings, but with so many blocks coming together to form the pattern, it was pretty impossible and I settled for the few I ended up with. 

I almost regret not making it a little larger, and I have to keep reminding myself that it's a completely acceptable size for a lap quilt. I tend to make my quilts large. But, we are all tall people, so we like our quilts big! :-)