Buckled down this evening and pieced these strips together in about an hour. 8 more sets to go. I went slow to try to avoid bowing, because I've had problems with that in the past. I took Eileen Wright's advice in her book, and pieced two strips together at a time (starting at the top). Then I combined the strip chunks by sewing in the opposite direction (from the bottom), so that every other seam was sewn in the opposite direction. I could not detect any bowing so far, so hooray!
Now, I didn't do any pressing yet, so any creases and/or bulgy-looking bits are only due to that and not my stitching (I swear)
Looking at them like this, I can see that a couple fabrics will not make the continuous blend that I tried for, but I think it makes a nice run, nonetheless, and might actually foster a kind of echo in the pattern with the leaf print teal in the middle. Might lend itself to the ocean more than I expected, so hooray for happy, unexpected effects. I am liking this quilt more and more, can't wait until I get to start slicing and piecing rows.