Wendy at Pieceful Thoughts posted the second prompt for the Stay At Home Round Robin yesterday. The prompt was “any star.” which appeals to me. I picked the Friendship Star–if it is still named that when the center is a four-patch. It seemed good to echo the center ov my center block. Choosing the star wasn’t the cause of indecision; layout was.
Ever since I’ve been doing medallion quilts I’ve wanted to do one with pieced triangles to set the center on point. I always consider it, but usually my center block doesn’t like being on point. This was no exception, although in my mind the design “standing” on one “leg” seemed it would add motion to the juggler motion already noted. But it didn’t.

Instead of increasing the motion it decreased it. The dark squares formed solid looking verticals and horizontals and way too much stability. So no on-point this quilt.
I’d also considered closing it in with the next border and starting ordinary borders but a suggestion from last week to continue the spiral effect caught my fancy. My first thought was to do so with a star on each side.

I wasn’t thrilled, but then further borders could make it work. I began to think measurements. The star row will be another 3-inch border, and my original plan had been a 40 x 40 quilt. That would leave only 6 inches for the next four borders. And making the stars smaller than a three-inch block wouldn’t seem to be good proportion. Even though Sally Collins in her Borders, Bindings, and Edges recommends the border pieces be smaller than pieces in the center block. I’d not started out with smaller. And in addition the 3-inch spool block looks larger than the 3-inch star block–very interesting what placement of lights and darks does. Of course I could also change the finished measurement goal. But if I were to go for a larger quilt I’d probably want a rectangle. So I considered two stars top and bottom.

It has potential, and I like it better than one on each side. But there’s one more thing to try: echoing the three squared that make the juggler effect with a placement of three.

I think I like it. But again a lot depends on what the next prompt brings. Oh I know I can skip a row or modify a row, or do my own thing. But for me part of the challenge is to take the prompt and make it work.
So, till next week . . .