Ok, so I'm actually glad that no one guessed I was making another mini basket.  I hate to be entirely predictable!  But, yes, I had another little gift to make, so this was the perfect way to see if my clamshell obsession could be righted with just a quickie make.

It wasn't.  More on that after these photos...



Scrappy nonsense.  I actually used circles cut for this ill-fated project.  So nice to recycle abandoned wip's.



The inside is a gorgeous bit of Liberty Lifestyle, gifted to me by a friend and thus so fitting to gift to another.



Twill be hard to let this one go!

Ok, Clamshells.

I think I need to make a genuine, serious, no-holding-back clamshell quilt.  And it needs to be washable (no raw edge applique), not painfully slow and certainly not hand sewn.  Are you tracking here?  (If you're not sure what all the fuss is, check out this dreamy quilt and this punchy piece.  There.)

Certainly, one can machine piece large clamshells, but I like them smaller.  I think applique is way easier with this shape. So... how about machine applique, quilt-as-you-go clamshells.  Takers?  You can cut yours with a cutting die OR by hand with a template.  We'll press the curved side of the clamshell under and applique in one long row at a time, much like I did with my tutorial yesterday.  I'm thinking to get my stuff together to launch a quilt-along in February.  Just wondering if I'm the only one...

xo,

Rachel

p.s.  Of course, I'll show you how!