Wildyard, the way I took the instructions was that I just cut enough strips to do this step and didn't concern myself overly with how many fabrics I wanted to use. I am cutting my strips in width such that it makes dividing the number of needed units easily and works well with the odd shaped pieces I have... With my collection of fabric it happens with the reds that it meant basically one cut from each piece, if I had full width of yardage I'd use less. In comparison, I barely touched my darks and used maybe half of my mediums in this step. I never reduced my available yardage to the required yardage and expect to use maybe half of what I prepared.
One thing I was aware of from the beginning is that the scale of pieces Bonnie uses means that my hand dyed fabric will mostly read as solid by the time it is cut down -- and that's true with step one. Although I can tell/recognize that 10 different reds were used, it "looks" more like 3 and I'm trying to keep out squares that read as yellow since that is my version of neutral.
I really like how she doubles the cutting. I felt I could get more variety the way I normally do things but as it turns out, it's pretty much meaningless effort since the mottled small pieces turn out so similarly and mostly what you see is some version of superman's cape to black/red. Am considering fully following the directions next time as this time I just increased my effort without results -- I think anyway.
Edit: Joe's Mom, I too am already not very happy with my cutting and piecing. For me these are tiny little widths, I usually don't cut below 2.5", but the reality is that is just an excuse and all we really should be concerned with is the accurate cutting and that darn 1/4", no matter how much or little is on the other side of the seam. Again, it will be a good skill builder for me because my usual style is pretty fast and loose, but you can do that with larger pieces. I am wishing I had my Bernina working (maybe I'll see if it decides to play today, since it decided not to sew correctly randomly maybe it will turn on and work fine!) or maybe I'll set up my trusty vintage machine instead of the cheapo Brother I'm using.
Don't know if I mentioned, but the car repair came in under estimate! Still expensive but I should still have budget for the Bernina servicing. Feels good to have the opportunity to drive myself, but with all the sewing I haven't bothered to do any yet
