Thank you, thank you, thank you! I appreciate all your opinions, and have tired my arms out working on the design wall (back of a vinyl tablecloth), making so many variations. And I thought I was almost finished! ... so I'm going to let these ideas incubate a while. I find that it works best if you let things muddle around in your head for a while. But I honestly thank you for your opinions. I think I'm going to keep the flying geese, as some of those birds flew all the way from Australia, or Scotland or further. That was my intention in keeping all those duplicates. Like, "If you get lemons, make lemonade", if you get doubles in a quilt exchange, make flying geese Every one is special, right? Margo, thanks for your super idea, I love your quilt idea - I put it up on the wall, and really liked it. However, I'm not very good at fancy quilting yet, and I only have a domestic machine. I may hand quilt this. Machine quilting makes me nervous (but I'll get over it - someday)

Crocus, I don't know if it appeals to you, but I used both a pieced border and a wide border for fancy quilting, because I happen to like borders and definite boundaries!
My solid border is 8" wide.

Check it out: [url]forum/friendship-triangle-exchange/4671-its-a-small-world[/url]

crocus999 wrote:



I like this one with the neutral and the smaller red border or the flying geese in the neutral border. Either way this is really a lovely quilt.
Ginochka

Beautiful! I like the flying geese in the border - I especially like the way it looks on your wall - that is, with the border being partly flying geese and then maybe dwindling off into the solid neutral. Throws a little bit of asymmetry into the works. Great job in any case!

I like the last best of all, but everyone is different. I think your quilt is beautiful.

Your quilt looks really good. Personally, I love the flying geese around the border with the red sashing strips between. I think it would be great if you had the same width again of a neutral between the flying geese and the red borders. Such great work and such lovely hst's I am only sorry that I joined the quilt show too late to be in on the exchange. The best of luck with it.

Maybe this is better? Does the big red border take away from seeing the design? I could make the neutral border even wider and do a bit of applique? Sorry the colour isn't great, but you get the idea...thanks

Like Dwynette says, go with what YOU like! I don't think you can go wrong, 'cause it all looks great!

Maybe it would help if you already have some idea how you want to quilt it.
Your quilting designs will not show much at all in the center of the quilt, so if you want a place to show off nice quilting,
you will need either a red or lighter colored wide border to play in!

JMHO!

Beautiful! I bet you get as many suggestions as you get responses! Go with what you like best! I like the border you have planned; but I think I'd open it up a little more by having less red and more of the light color.

I like it with just the red border. Just my opinion but I think the other border takes away from the your quilt design. Shirley

So far, I have all the HSTs in the center sewn together. Now I'm posting a few pics for those of you "seasoned sewing sisters" (or newbies, if you like) I just want opinions, because I am a newbie myself. What do you think of the borders? I got so many doubles, triples, quads etc, that I made flying geese of of them and thought I could incorporate them into the border. My idea was to use as little of my own fabric as possible. The red and white is mine - that's all. Should the widths be different? More White? No white? Questions abound. I have some subtle coloured HSTs that I am saving for a soft coloured table runner or baby quilt. I haven't gotten that sewn yet.
Opinions, please.

Thanks everyone! I now have two of four stars up on the wall and am still cutting background squares. I asked some of my guild ladies to give me some of their neutral smaller scraps, so I could have more variety in the background than my own scraps/stash of neutrals can give me.

Okay, back to the design wall and cutting board!

Thanks, Shirley.

Dwynette your quilt is beautiful. Michelle I like your block and think it's real cool. Shirley