More student's work...........
Here are a lot of pieces cut from a beige/brown/soft rust combination.
And here are 2 blocks ready to sew. She added the brown batik with horses in it.
This student had a lot of kid prints and added the black background prints as some of the plain (not pieced) sections. The orange dotted fabric was a nice addition too.
More of her design wall. 
This group of fabric has some soft gold tone light colors and slightly rusty red in with nice browns. This is what they did in the beginning, just cut lots of shapes from a strata. 
The next step is to start putting pieces together on the design wall to simulate blocks and then to sew the favorites right away. The not quite favorite ones might still get one piece changed out for another.
The fourth student just returned home from vacation in the wee hours so she just visited the class but didn't bring her project. I will get some pictures of hers next week.
Here are a lot of pieces cut from a beige/brown/soft rust combination.
And here are 2 blocks ready to sew. She added the brown batik with horses in it.This student had a lot of kid prints and added the black background prints as some of the plain (not pieced) sections. The orange dotted fabric was a nice addition too.More of her design wall. This group of fabric has some soft gold tone light colors and slightly rusty red in with nice browns. This is what they did in the beginning, just cut lots of shapes from a strata. The next step is to start putting pieces together on the design wall to simulate blocks and then to sew the favorites right away. The not quite favorite ones might still get one piece changed out for another.The fourth student just returned home from vacation in the wee hours so she just visited the class but didn't bring her project. I will get some pictures of hers next week.I finished cutting all of the Christmas strata and pieced 4 of the blocks together. I'm still contemplating making another strata to make more blocks. 
I got a little more of the hand sewing done on my batik binding. I took Cathi's advice and changed to a new needle and it is going much better. It is just so hard to throw away a needle that doesn't have a bend in it even if the point isn't as sharp any more. I guess this goes back to the fact that there was usually only one needle or maybe 2 in our household when I was growing up (non-sewing mother) so it was like you kept the same needle forever because there wouldn't be any to take its place. Old habits die hard.
I got a little more of the hand sewing done on my batik binding. I took Cathi's advice and changed to a new needle and it is going much better. It is just so hard to throw away a needle that doesn't have a bend in it even if the point isn't as sharp any more. I guess this goes back to the fact that there was usually only one needle or maybe 2 in our household when I was growing up (non-sewing mother) so it was like you kept the same needle forever because there wouldn't be any to take its place. Old habits die hard.