Experimentation

Periodically I participate in some online swaps through Flickr, and I’ve come to the conclusion that I vastly prefer the start-to-finish swaps — the ones where you send a completed project to someone and get a completed project in return — to the block swaps. I’m too persnickety about my piecing to do very well in block swaps, because I’ve discovered that many people do not share my neuroses about seam allowances. So blocks come back all different sizes and then I feel guilty if I can’t use them or have to remake them, which is ridiculous.

So. Recently I participated in my second “mug rug” swap — where you make a completed mini-placemat for a coffee mug based on the preferences of the person with whom you were matched. It’s a blind swap, so you don’t know who is making a mug rug for you. This time I was matched with Annie, who has preferences very similar to mine. In her profile, comments to others’ mug rugs, and survey answers, she basically told me to “go for it!” So I did.

I decided to try a new technique that I’ve been wanting to experiment with (the Silly BooDilly‘s non-pattern pattern. When I posted the picture of it, Annie was one of the first responders and was so enthusiastic! It made me so happy!

Annie sent to Sooz and Sooz sent to me and I sent to Annie, so we apparently were a little triangle of similar tastes… 🙂

Here’s what Sooz sent to me — isn’t it AWESOME!?

And here’s the one Annie sent Sooz:

I’d say we had a pretty rockin’ little group… 🙂

(I love working in this size — small enough to finish reasonably fast, but big enough to feel like you’ve done something… But if something happens and it doesn’t get delivered to its destination, you’re not completely crushed — you can just make another one.)