back to the drawing board

Daughter Janet called in yesterday, and I showed her my first crazy block. She admired the bird, and then asked "are they all going to be this bright?" Hmmm....

When she left, I took another look at the block. Liz wants light, bright pastel colours, but maybe not all in the one block?













 
I already knew that an analogous colour scheme works well - as in these two experimental blocks.

Could I perhaps shade the blocks across the quilt to create a colourwash effect?
 This morning I got out the textas and experimented, and came up with this -

 
Then I made a new block in lemon, lime, green and aqua. Much better!

 Don't expect much progress for the next few days, though, as we are in the grip of a heat wave - 39C today, and more to come.