It is feeling like Spring here in Northern California.  I am appreciating my bulbs that have already bloomed and the warmer weather which seems in stark contrast to the rest of the country.  (We would gladly take some of that snow and rain however given the multiple year drought we are in the midst of. Yikes!)

In any case, the March Bee Sewcial block challenge matches in palette and mood our current weather.  For details on this month’s challenge, check out Melissa’s instructional post on Flickr (Flickr: Discussing March is for Melissa! 🙂 in Bee Sewcial).  I must reiterate how fun this Bee has been.  It is forcing me to step out of my creative comfort zones and I have learned so much.

When planning my blocks for the month, I searched high and low on Pinterest and in Flickr for “transparency” inspiration.  Nothing seemed quite right so I finally settled on images that came out of the blue.  Translating those images to fabric was the big challenge and after considering several options, I decided to simply convert the scale pictures I had drawn directly into paper pieced patterns.

Making the points line up perfectly was the only real challenge of it all (along with picking the left over paper pieces off the back of the fabric.)  I can imagine glue basting would work well for this (another new method to try out).  I am now completely hooked on making paper piecing patterns.

And I think I can now call myself an official quilter after making two ginormous design walls.  That’s right, I will no longer be doing design layouts on the floor.  What a concept!  Now I just have to find a better fabric cutting spot as the floor is still my go to.  Kneeling, bending and squatting are good for you right?

Though I enjoyed playing with the new colors in Melissa’s palette I needed to nurture my creative rebel side a tad and made up the block above.  This design has been in my head for awhile.  I can imagine a quilt made of several similar equilateral triangles.  Unfortunately my darn new ideas keep competing with old plans for time on my sewing machine.  I have so many plans lined up I’m going to have to farm out some tops for quilting by others I think.

My mailbox and heart have been bursting with love from the huge hearted quilting community I now feel a part of.  Anne de Waxholm (Holland) (https://www.flickr.com/photos/anne_de_waxholm) and Berene (Canada) (@happysewlucky on Instagram) sent me their contributions to the “Nude is Not a Dresscolor” project.  Don’t they play well together?

I also got some similar blocks from Krista (Poppyprint) while at Quiltcon along with other special goodies and a signed copy of her new book (Martingale – Make It, Take It (Print version + eBook bundle)).  I can’t wait to make a couple of projects highlighted in it.

Chawne Kimber (completely cauchy.) was super sweet and sent me some of her Quilting business cards, some fabric and a pin of one of her gorgeous Quiltcon quilts.  I was bummed to miss her at the event but appreciate our ongoing dialogue online and look forward to a face to face meet up sometime in the future.

Lastly, along with her gorgeous Shirt Blocks, Berene sent me some hand printed linen tags that make reference to my day job.  They read “Quilts are the best medicine” , “Inject a little creativity into life”, “flesh and fabric are my canvas” and “give me sutures or thread and I will stitch beauty”.  Crazy amazing and generous right?!  These are going on some of my quilts for sure.

Wishing you a creative weekend.

Hillary