Anchors Away

How do you pick your fabrics?  That's something that has been running around in my mind all day.  I think most of my quilts to date have been in one of two categories.  They have either been super scrappy or have been made from one line of fabric.  Not a lot of mixing and matching going on in my world but I would like to try to outreach more in that direction.  A while back my mom surprised me with a quilt kit she picked up down in Florida.

I give my mom a lot of credit because most of this kit is made up of Neptune which my mom had no idea I had been secretly lamenting having come into quilting to late to have any of this great fabric.  You know it's one of those lines like Flea Market Fancy, everyone wants it but only a few people actually have any.  At lease it seems that way.  What my mom did know at the time was that I had been constantly chewing her ear off about Freshcuts by Heather Bailey.  I was having a hard time finding it and really wanted to make a quilt from the line because Heather is one of my favorite designers.  My mom recognized one of the prints as Freshcuts and snapped up the kit.  I was thrilled when she gave it to me.  Intimidated to no end by convinced that I wanted to make the quilt picture here.

Now that I'm ready to start thinking about making said quilt I've been wondering why in the world would the add Freshcuts to a primarily Neptune quilt?  The colors are the right shades.  The prints are the right sizes.  But flowers and turtles?  Flowers and anchors?  I think I am going to give credit to the store and say that they got it right in this case because when it's all stacked up it looks great.  But in my quilt I think I am going to try and hunt down a few elusive fat quarters of Neptune.  The pattern actually calls for 2 layer cakes and 9 fat quarters plus yardage for boarders, binding, and backing.  The shop included 9 fat quarters and 21 cuts that measure 12 inches by width of fabric.  I have no idea what I am going to do when it comes time to find boarder and backing fabric but in the mean time I'm looking forward to making this quilt this year.  Even if I am a little scared of it.  I'd love to hear your processes for selecting fabrics.  Let me know, how do you mix and match?  And if you have any leads on Neptune I'd love to hear those too.