Jolly Ranchers: A value exercise

Over at the fabulous Stitched in Color, Rachel has been leading a value added quilt along challenging us to incorporate and consider value as a critical design element in quilts.  I've certainly found that in quilts where I make an effort to include a wide range of values, the outcome is definitely more striking.  As soon as I saw this series of posts,  I thought of a quilt my mom made several years ago, and thought I'd share it!

My mom and I designed this quilt and she made it a few years ago when we were baby beginner quilters.  I think it was probably the second quilt she made.  It lives now on the guest bed in my sister's old room so I was lucky enough to get to sleep under it when I was just there for thanksgiving.

When I first drafted the block for this we thought it was original, but quickly realized otherwise, I think it's just what you'd call a wonky log cabin block.  What I think really makes this quilt special is how the color selection makes the block disappear giving a great sense of motion.

One of the things I've always thought contributed significantly to the design, specifically to the sense of depth and motion is the range of values in the pinks and greens.  I think the dark light transition of the green and purple adds a lot of visual interest to the design.  Mom named the quilt Jolly Ranchers since the intense colors reminded her of the grape and apple candies.

Jolly Ranchers, c. Vicki Conley, 2007, 78" x 90"

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Hope you enjoy this quilt, I really love it and am so glad she kept it!

I'm going to go ahead and link up with the value added flickr group and QAL linky; Rachel said it was okay even thought it wasn't a new quilt since I haven't shared before.  

Many thanks to her and her co-hosts for their fun posts!