A Ghastly surprise!

My final big fabric purchase of 2011...and boy was it a doozy.  The Ghastlies by Alexander Henry was my final purchase since the great purse tightening and I am so happy I bought it.  I coveted this fabric line last year...and yet did nothing!  So, when it was released again this year I hopped on that ghastly train as soon as I could.

Here is what I bought of the awesome Addam's Family-esque fabric.  And you'll have to tell me what you think of the color-way.  LOVE IT personally. 

The lady in the lower right-hand corner...she is mean.  I would not mess with her...just look at her eyes...she's had a little too much crazy for breakfast.  I love the Mama witch hovering over her son.  You just know he's a mama's boy.

And this nice gent...don't get me wrong but...he kind of looks like my...Dad.  I love that he's walking an invisible dog too!

Family supper.  I love it.  It' just like when my family gets together...except for the spooky servants and the bell.  But...OH...how I wish I had a bell to summon my heart's desires.  I also love the cat lounging at the foot of the table.

If you look closely, pardon the wrinkles of course.  But there are the Weird Sisters in the middle.  The furthest one on the right is looking at you...looking at her...looking at you.  So suspicious.  Don't you wonder what they are up to?

And here is the family enjoying their evening after the tasty supper.  The knitters in the corner kill me.  They are so suspicious...and what are they knitting anyway?  I figure it's something for their...pet. 

And all the rest.  This is the rest of the fabric line, plus the solids that I have chosen to go with my project.  What do you think of the color scheme...MAUVE!!   I mean, I haven't been this into mauve since my next door neighbor decorated her house using a tasteful combo of forest green and mauve.  SEXY!  I so wanted my house to be forest green and mauve.  But, now I get a little taste of the mauve love....in my Halloween decor.  It's perfect if you ask me.  It's kind of a corpse color-way.

Next the problem was...what am I doing to do with all this fabulous fabric?  My sister says it looks Roald Dahl.  I agree.  What's the book about the really gross people and there's a picture of the man's beard and he's got all kinds of nastiness in there.  Gross! 

Anyway, I have all kinds of ideas and pictures for all kinds of quilts...but the problem with this fabric is the pictures are so large, and I love them, so I want to showcase the fabric as well as patchwork.  Mr. Because I Can tells me ever since my Wizard of Oz quilt that I have developed a love for panels...I told him, this doesn't count as a panel.  A panel is yucky and runs across the entire width of the fabric.  This is just cute design.  It's different...clearly.  So I have decided to cut large 15 x 15 blocks for the fun scenes and then do a string-quilt block that's 15 x 15 and have these blocks run 3 across and 3 down in an alternating fashion.

Here's the beginnings...

You might wonder what wild quilt pattern is that?

It's because I forgot to mention I am paper piecing the string quilt.  I love paper piecing.  There really is something satisfying about ripping off the back paper.  It's totally fun...unless you mess up and don't rip cleanly and then it just leaves a giant chunk of paper that's a pain to get off.  So rip cleanly!  Oh, and rip from the outer edges in.  So once you make it to the middle, start at the other end and work in to the middle a second time.  Much easier!

RIIIPPPPPPPP!

Here is the final outcome.

Hope you like it.  Stay tuned for more Ghastly updates!