Surge

This quilt was made for my brother Angus, who is younger, athletic and bursting with energy. His favourite colours are blues, purples, and greens. The quilt started life as a foundation pieced travelling project, so half the blocks are hand pieced.

To my horror, when I had made about fifty blocks and laid them out I found I had made an old lady's quilt. The lighter shades I had used - pale blues and mauves - had a 'lavender and old lace' feeling to them which was not Angus - and was not really to my taste either. The whole thing went into the UFO box for a year.

I put aside blocks with greyed pale shades, and substituted lights which sang - like lime and clear pale blues. I added some glowing hot colour. I had drafted the original block as a nine patch - not knowing that a 'correct' Kaleidoscope block is drafted like an eight pointed star. This meant that in some places I could drop in other nine patch blocks and the lines would still connect. I really like the block and its possibilities and have based other quilts on it.

The title refers to 'full speed ahead' in Dragon Boat racing.

See Playing with kaleidoscopes for more information.