I'm making a quilt!

So I've decided to make a quilt. And I'm actually making it! I've always wanted to do something like this, but I've never really wanted to actually do the quilting. I love the piecing process, but I could easily pass on the quilting, especially if it needs to be done by hand. I'm thinking about having it machine quilted, but it depends on how it turns out.

Here are the colors:

The furthest right fabric is my favorite and kind of what all the colors are based on.  The browns are more of an accent color, as it will end up being mostly blue and white.

This is what I did yesterday:

This is going to be a diamond shape in the middle, which you can't really tell from this picture. I'll post more once I get the next section done. I had enough white muslin on hand to be able to complete the big square in the middle, and I'm about to finish the border around that. Then there will be a white border, then the outer blue border.

Each border will be strip pieced with a repeating pattern of the four colors, roughly 3 inches wide. It's exciting that I don't have too much left, but the strip piecing is rather daunting. It's a lot of ironing and trimming and sewing and cutting (not in that order though).

Oh... and I think I just heard 8 gun shots in my complex and Nat's in Canada. Anyone have a dog I can borrow for the night? I'm staying inside and not answering the door ever. It just went off again. Scary!