When I said in the last post that I didn't mind clipping the dog ears on HST it reminded me of what I like to do with them.

I wrote about my bear jar here, back in 2009, and I've been filing my tiny triangle clippings there ever since. I thought he was  nearly full about three years ago, but I keep squashing the bits down and making more room. I'm beginning to doubt he can ever be filled to capacity!

It's a harmless diversion for me, and at least the bits aren't being tracked all over the house  as they were in the past. But heavens, nearly six years of sewing are represented here, I reckon it will take another two or three years to get to the brim....

Anyhoo, the HST have taken a backseat again and I've moved on to setting a long term project into a top. Last year in March I started playing around with Ohio stars, and I've been steadily making them over the last 15 months or so.

I've made enough of the green and cream ones seen in that post to make a full size quilt, and I had nearly enough of the ones with the dark background. My inspiration for that idea was a quilt

 found in this book, American Quilt Classics by Patricia Cox.

I think I was inspired by the fact that we had a half bolt of a Jo Morton fabric that I thought would be perfect for the setting squares.

So off I went, madly making stars, and then was slightly disappointed to find that the fabric seemed to suck all the life out of the other colours.

I really wanted to use this particular  material- we had lots of it! In desperation I kept using deeper and darker colours so that they would stand out against the fabric, and I became more and more dissatisfied with how it was looking. It's amazing how long we cling  to some ideas, even though they're obviously not working.

Finally I realised "Just get rid of that fabric!" and I started to search for the 'perfect' setting material. The first fabric was too brown, so I've been buying fat quarters of all sorts of yellowy caramel,  yellowy tan, yellowy brown in hopes of finding "The One". Keryn will bear witness to how much angst has been involved in this; she is heartily sick of the Star Sagas and can hardly wait to see this in one piece!

Finally, I tried this, without much hope, and when I laid the stars on it everything just settled in to place.

I never would have picked it in the first place, and if I had access to more patchwork shops I still might have found something better. But it's good enough! The top has four more seams to sew, and I can start whining about the border choices, that should be fun...

Recently I was going through an old Quilt magazine when I saw this photo. Could it be... yes there is the same pink and red star on the right hand side. The setting fabric looks completely different, and there is no border at all. Mine will have at least one, just not sure what at this stage... Stay tuned!