Welcome back!
Another year, another quilt. Or another UFO for the pizza boxes under the bed! I hope not. I hope you like this one so much you finish it! Month after month in 2001 we are going to make blocks in pairs, one block a "Place" and the other block a "Person." One will be easy and the other a little more complicated to cut and piece. We'll make them in various sizes. For some we will use a rotary cutter, and for a few there might be careful instructions to cut out a few odd-shaped patches. All of our blocks will be based on a 3-inch increment. We will make blocks that are 3 inches, 6 inches, 9 inches, 12 inches, and even 15 inches (finished sizes).

Most of the blocks in BOM 2001 will have some history, and I'll tell you what I know (frequently it will be what I can find in the newest edition of the BlockBase program from Electric Quilt - what a terrific resource!). At year's end we will put together a quilt with these various-sized blocks, filling in with Log Cabins or Nine-Patches or Flying Geese. The quilts will be gorgeous! And all will be very different, our quilts of People & Places.

Fabrics -
It's just impossible to estimate how much you will need for a whole quilt made this way. But it's not impossible to guess about color!! Do please choose a color family that you love … maybe a yard each of four or five fabrics to have as your "stash" for this year's projects. More or less. You can always buy more, if you are choosing by a color group and not just one manufacturer's pre-determined fabric grouping (as beautiful as they are, they may not be right for this People & Places quilt). Choose a dark, a medium, and a light. Now choose another medium and another light. Maybe another dark too. Maybe ½ yard of eight different fabrics. See where I'm going? Please don't paint yourself into a corner.

Don't let it get complicated! In our cutting and sewing instructions, we will talk about dark and medium and light. If you can put your fabrics into those three piles, you are all set. There's a gadget called a "Ruby Beholder" to help sort out intensities of color. Looking at your fabrics through it, you can quickly see which are dark, light, and medium (being red itself, it doesn't work for red fabric). Another old trick is to Xerox the fabrics; it's easy then to lay them out from light to very dark, dealing with just shades of gray.

Try to use a variety of texture in the fabrics. Think about plaids, prints, geometrics, quilters' solids. See if you can include a couple of light-giving colors (where one color runs from very dark through medium all the way to bright on the same cut of cloth … splashed with a bright touches, looks like dappled sunlight ... brings a quilt to life).

The easiest way to gather up a palette is to choose a print that you absolutely love, and then find fabrics with subtle textures in colors that blend with the main print. The odd thing is that then you don't have to use that original print at all. You will have an arm full of beautiful fabrics that "go together" and you can save the original print for the border or even the backing, if you want to. (Sometimes coming up with those "go together" colors is the hardest part of all. If you find yourself grabbing a perfect stranger by the elbow in the quilt store and asking for her opinion, welcome to my world!)

Equipment -
Same old wonderful quilting things: Rulers, mat, rotary cutter, scissors, iron, some pins, needle/thread, sewing machine.

Blocks for People & Places -
Each month you will see two blocks and the directions to make them. Often I will suggest that you make the same block more than once so it will be ready to use in the finished quilt. As the year comes to an end, you can make any more blocks you need to duplicate, or add blocks of your own. While I will help you decide on a final lay-out, the decision will be yours. Your quilt, your choice.

I will be using blocks that have people and places in them, and for me this will be a memory quilt. With every block I make, I'll be remembering a special place and someone wonderful ... I'll meet old friends in the yesterdays we shared, and it will be a quilt I'll treasure always.

The Butterfly --  
All through this year, LDRS HBBY Pat's butterfly  will lead to new ideas, new skills. In October you will reach for Crayolas to design your own quilt. In August Pat shows us how to make a paperpieced pattern. The bump-less four-patch is explained in January, and a square-up method for making HSTs (half-square triangles) in May. Each month we can follow the flutter to something a little different, something new to try. You'll like it, I promise!

Block names -
If you went through BOM 2000 with me, you surely know I'm a great believer in changing blocks, changing block names. Making them fit. So please alter these blocks, these names. Change the patterns of lights/darks and re-name the blocks to make your own memories.

The nitty-gritty --
I won't be going through the 1-2-3 of cutting and pressing like we did with the Beginner's BOM of 2000. Please remember, though, that those "lessons" are still there for your reference, if you need them. Somehow I think you are shaking your head back and forth, saying, "Is she kidding … I know about HSTs and QSTs and stuff like that ..."

Unlimited possibilities --
So you can see what kind of quilts will be possible with these blocks of various sizes at the end of the year, here are couple of quilts for inspiration. These are colors of my imagination; the quilt in my real world will be done in shades of teal ... and these are examples only; we will not be making all of these specific blocks. Won't it be fun to fit the patches together! What a special quilt! Not one made from a pattern, or from a book, or from a kit … but a quilt from the heart. I hope you will want to come with me through this People & Places quilt for 2001.

January is ready! See you there …

LDRS HBBY RathrB