The stars have it

Veteran's Day was the perfect time to work on a patriotic quilt.  I had the stars all appliqued, but needed to work out how to set them.  The beauty of designing with Electric Quilt software is that it is so easy to make changes and see what they might look like.   My first thought was a straight forward setting, alternating with striped blocks:

I thought that the striped blocks might be too dark, so I lightened them up:

Now the stripes are competing with the stars.  Maybe if I framed the stars to make them stand out?

Better, but omething about the stripes looked unbalanced to me, so I tried a different alternate square:

Almost went with this setting, but I really wanted some stripes.   Maybe all the stripes going in the same direction would make it look more balanced.

One more change, making the stripes less prominent:

At last, I got the setting I had been searching for.  It sort of looked like the framed stars were hanging from striped ribbons.  The stars made from shirt fabrics are highlighted nicely, and I also liked that the stripes look a little like the ribbons you would find on a military uniform.

Here's the resulting quilt top:

You'll have to take my word for it, the red fabric is not that bright.   The actual colors are more like this:

Oh, and if it looks like there are wrinkles in the upper corners, that's because of this:

Can't wait to get this quilted up, and given to my mother-in-law.