I think I'm going to go ahead and glue down the garland, trim the blocks to size and sew one of each, then look again.  I'm wondering if perhaps doing a mix would look ok - kind of like picture frames on a black background.  We'll see.  I need to figure out the math to trim these blocks - kind of a tetris puzzle.

here is another thing against the red, I have another Christmas quilt with red sashing.  Not sure I want another.  decisions decisions!

Mishii said:

What about gold for the sashing

OMG!  You are a trouble maker... lol

I'll cut a strip and give it a look. 

I just like gold on Christmas stuff with black. Looks more….elegant maybe?

My reds are always too red and seems to make it look more juvenile, but I don’t have a very good red stash so there is that.

the red I'm thinking about is more of a muted burgundy, not purple but not orange.  definitely not true red.  The gold I tried (I have a couple that read pretty gold)  look too yellow against the black.  And I have a definite predisposition against yellow.  I don't exactly have a favorite color but yellow is my least favorite.  Yellow is the color of nausea for me.  I think it's all those years of driving across the desert with my dad smoking.  Irrational but there it is.  I can only take yellow in very small doses.

And I really don't like the green fabric I have.  I like the color but it is a typical calico which doesn't fit with the rest of the quilt's semi-Victorian feel.  So I would need to go shopping.  Tipping towards that red.

Dull muted gold would be perfect but since you flat out reject that color, then it has to be red.

Stand back and look through a door peekaboo viewer thingamabob and you will see that there is already a lot of green so green sashing would be too, too much.

The red caught my eye right away.  The green seems to lack the same pizzazz .

Cris in MT

 what finally decided me was looking at the various sashing fabrics I had pulled, and which one I honestly liked as a fabric.  Red it is.

Looks pretty red right now.  But I know the green across the top will offset that some.