The Sum of Its Parts

It took awhile.  After much pondering and unease, I finished the GI Mystery Quilt.

  I liked the idea of just sashing the blocks I had with some polka dot fabric cause we all know polka dots improve everything, right?

But I was short a bunch. Drat.

And in a comical attempt to calm things down (as if), I wanted to use this medium blue in all the cornerstones,

Again, short a bunch.

 So I went with the dot idea again being I had enough of this Very Favorite All-Time Most Wonderful Fabric Ever Made Michael Miller polka dot,

I love this fabric!  I only managed to get the end-of-the-bolt at my LQS last year.  I put a bit of it into this quilt before I realized how it would turn out.  Killed me to use up more of it in the cornerstones.  In retrospect, I should have just went with a mix of the blues I used in the quilt per the designer's scheme.

And yes, that is sewn wrong.  I was tempted it to just leave it.  But I didn't.

Here it is,

before the final borders!  Dizzy yet?!  Again, so tempted to leave the borders off, but they were made and not wanting any extra parts to remind me of this fiasco,  on they went. 

All finished, 89 inches square,

A close-up of a corner,

I'm glad I stuck with it and it's now done.  I dislike it for a few reasons.  It violates "the rules" and not in an artistic way that works; the busyness of the sashing and incorrect use of value doesn't allow the spinning block to really show. There's just too much going on!  I haven't decided the backing or binding yet nor if I'm going to quilt it myself,  or send it out.  I do know I won't be doing any more mystery quilts.

Anyone else finished theirs?

A Grand Mess

Not a happy sewist here!  If you are/were doing the Grand Illusion Mystery Quilt sponsored by Bonnie Hunter and you like it, you might want to stop reading right now!

I had to play catch-up after Thanksgiving with the clues as I had about a 10 day late start.  Pushed myself rather hard to finish all the clues, I might add, but finish them I did.  You see I wanted to be all ready prior to the finale that way I'd be off and sewing when the big reveal came.  If you're sewing along, you know it came on New Year's Eve.  And...

OMG! I hate it!  

To me it is a jumbled mess, the fabric choices are all wrong, and the sashing, oy!  And I used the same fabrics that BH did so it's not as if I used a dark rather than a light.  The ironic thing is, I didn't really care for the color choices but figured I couldn't go wrong using what the 'designer' did.  Ha!  Did I mention this is the very first Quiltville MQ I have ever done?  

What to do.  What to do.

I finished sewing the 25 blocks today.  (::sigh:: I even committed to the full version, fool that I am!)   

Here's one of them.

And the rest.  It's not too bad without the intended sashing.  I know many people are leaving that off and doing solid sashing to calm things down a bit.  

Auditioning the busy green sashing. Whew!  I think the blocks just disappear when the sashing is added. And I somehow have missed the name, where's the illusion?  I've tried to like it but it just doesn't work.  And those black squares the way they don't line up with the black HST just keeps annoying me.  But I hate the thought of having these quilt parts leftover if I don't use the sashing. ::sigh:: 

I don't know what to do. Finish it and be done, or come up with another way that I can live with?

Any ideas?   You'll just have to excuse me now while I go have a good cry.