Done...

At 9:13 PM last evening I put the last stitch in this quilt that I have named "Filling Negative Spaces".

It took me 7 days to complete this quilt from start to finish but I did not work on it at all on Sunday, so 6 work days.

It has a double meaning. First of all the obvious, filling the negative or background spaces of the quilt with beautiful designs. Practicing and perfecting them, making them my own by putting my signature style on them.

Here is the top edge and some of the quilting in the block area showing too. I did a peacock type feather in the square. The center pieced section is were the pops of color and pattern come in to play in this quilt. The focal point of the quilt.

In the bottom panel, which is all background fabric, I broke up the area with some quilted blocks that got there own motifs quilted into them. This is the largest box.

Secondly, I have been thinking about what fills up the negative spaces in our lives. What do we fill our lives with? Are the things we are busy doing adding to our lives in a beautiful and orderly manner or do they lead to chaos? As I look at this quilt, if I focused solely on some of the background areas they could seem unruly and messy I might think that the quilt as a whole is a mess, but when I regard the quilt in its entirety I see the beauty that would not be there without all the components. The dense busy quilted areas make the other areas pop and stand out. This is the same as our daily lives, the things that we are doing might seem like so much busy work and repetitive but these are the things that make the special moments wonderfully beautiful. Why is it even important to create beauty in such a world that is full of tradegy and ugliness? We do it to create a place of refuge and safety. Yes it all could be taken away in a flash but that doesn't mean we give up trying to do all we can to make this a better place in which to live while we are here. We can make beauty out of what is presented to us.

What do you think? I took what I had and made something of beauty. It took me way out of my normal comfort zone. I learned a lot. How we choose to fill the backgrounds (our lives) will be different for everyone but overall it tells our story. We have a story worth telling. Take some time to think about what story the activities in your life are telling. If you need to delete some then do so, if you need to add certain ones that reflect better the story you are trying to tell then do that. If you are frazzled by too many things then edit down to what is the most important to enhance your story. We all hope for the happy ever after ending but sometimes we forget that it is what we do or don't do today that gives us that ending to our story. Our families and friends are the beautiful centerpieces of our lives and its the background fills that bind us together and ground us.

Have a wonderful day. Don't neglect the story of your life that your actions are telling and don't let the activities tell a story that you don't want told.