Pugs in the Garden Row by Row

Next month my Brown Baggers Quilt Group is kicking off a Row by Row challenge organized by the newly-retired Nancy D. Nancy had so many responses that she ended up forming two groups of five people. A Row by Row is similar to a Round Robin. Each person will create a row. The next person adds a row, and so on. If I've counted on my fingers correctly, I think that I will get my completed quilt top back in October.

It took me a while to get my project going. My theme is Pugs in the Garden. I've always wanted to make a pug quilt. I added the garden component so my fellow sewing swappers would have plenty of ideas to work with.

I started playing around with ideas on Tuesday night. This is what I started with.

Pug Flower Power!

I liked it. It was feelin' kind of groovy. I brought my husband Mike into the Studio for a second opinion. Mike is also very artistic and creative and has a really good color sense having worked in the printing industry for over 20 years. Mike immediately suggested a darker background. That was a good idea!

We experimented with a few green batiks to suggest grass, but in the end, this gorgeous turquoise won out. Now my pugs are really popping against this pretty background. Mike also thought that the flowers should have stems, so I cut up some green batik and moved things around some more. And since there were stems, I decided to add leaves as well.

I experimented with different flower arrangements some more on Wednesday night. I tried putting the stems on top of the pugs, as shown on the right, to suggest that they were among the flowers, but Mike didn't like it. I really like the scale of the small pugs with the giant flowers.

 Still playing. Trying to add maximum flower power for lots of color!

This is where my Row by Row is headed. My applique is in progress. I've got all the stems and leaves done and both of the fawn colored pugs. I still have four large flowers, two small flowers and the black pug to blanket stitch.

Here is my real life quilt inspiration!

Romeo, age 12.

Elvis, age 11.

LarryPug, age 5.

I'm so excited about this project. I usually follow a pattern, so I really had to channel my inner artistry to get this project going. I'm really looking forward to working on my friends' rows. Joannie is doing a sewing theme. I've seen her starting row and it is really great too! I don't think I can show you the rows in progress because it is supposed to be a surprise, so you will probably have to wait for the big reveal this Fall!

I hope that all of your quilting projects are going well! Linking up on Friday to Confessions of a Fabric Addict and Richard and Tanya Quilts. Linking up on Tuesday to Freemotion by the River. Thanks so much for visiting!

Pugs and kisses,
Nancy