Thank you Katie, that is a good idea on the size of prints. Have been looking at all the fabric on thousands of bolts dot com and the ones I liked and placed in my cart do have different size prints; although I had not really thought of that, just picked ones I liked. And the suggestion about using a darker color for a background makes sense. A friend loaned me a book and I found that what I called a border around every 9 block is called sashing. So the sashing will be a darker color; either a brown leaf type, or I found one I like with small sunflowers, but that may make it too busy. I know my wife is always telling different items I pick out to go together for wall paper, Christmas paper, etc. is "too busy". But so far she has not wanted to look at the samples of fabric online I have found that I like. I may just have to buy the fabric and wait for it to come to get her input. But I will keep in mind to combine smaller prints with larger prints.
Thank you for the color wheel sites, they are very helpful. And the quiltopia site has a page to build your block, that is helpful.
Checked into a quilt class today in town; she is looking at September to have a class. I'm not sure how fast I'll be, but I'd like to have this done for Christmas.
Jack