Batik Block Swap Package Arrived!

Yippee, my package of 24 pieced batik blocks arrived in today's mail!  I'm very pleased with the variety of pattern and color.  Rather than set the blocks in a rectangle, I will piece one more block to fill in the missing corner so I can have a square wall hanging.  All but one of the blocks originated in the United States and oddly enough several of the quilters were Judy's.  The 'international block' was sent from Scotland, UK which makes this project even more special to me.  I think the coordinator of this online batik block swap achieved a well blended assortment of blocks for me to finish a quilt with.  I'd definitely participate in another block swap or maybe a fabric swap in the future.  Here you can read more about various online quilting swaps.

Batik Block Swap

What do Japanese Lanterns and Log Cabin/Square in a Square quilt block patterns have in common? A dozen of each are practically flying out of my studio as my first quilt related project for 2011.
Recently I'd become acquainted with an online quilting group called the Quilting Board.  So I signed up and immediately got involved with a Batik Block Swap for January.  Most of the 52 committed participants are sewing one set (a dozen of one pattern), others are sewing two sets (a dozen of two different patterns) like myself. Wisely, I refrained from an overly ambitious goal of sewing three sets, as some eager beavers did, because I have easily put in 12 hours behind my machine on this project already.

Below you can see the secondary patterns when all of the blocks are laid out side by side. I wanted to have this recorded in my mind because I will only have one each of the two patterns I've made. In return, I will receive 22 different blocks that will hopefully compliment the color schemes I've chosen below. Without previous experience in doing a Block Swap, I'm thinking positive!