Pin-Prov Bee: Strips and Stripes

Each Friday, an ex-pat mothers-in-Japan group I am in on Facebook has a Grateful Friday thread. We have the rest of the week to whine and moan about life in Japan (not all the time, just sometimes), but each Friday we share something we’re grateful for. Well, it’s not Friday, and this isn’t that group, but I am so thankful for quilting bees who are so gracious and forgiving! Jess from The Elven Garden was Queen Bee for March and April, but then life pretty much happened for us all between quilt market prep, work travel, starting work, etc, etc. Add in my sewjo going missing and BAM. It’s mid-May and I still couldn’t get inspired.

Quilt for Material Obsession, photo by @annabelwrigley

She had asked for a low volume background, and she likes cool colours, and her Pinterest Inspiration Board had lots of stripes, so I knew I was going to pull from my bountiful blues and greens and make stripes of some sort. But what? Jess has a gift for working with colour and contrast, so I felt rather nervous about committing to anything I came up with, because what would be good enough for her?! But then as I was scrolling through the #quiltmarket feed on Instagram yesterday, I saw this quilt. My creative juices started pouring through my veins and I couldn’t wait to get started on my block! I haven’t felt this urge in so long, and it felt gooooood.

For this bee, we each make either a row of 12″x60″ or a patch of 24″x36″, according to the desires of the queen bee. Jess had requested a patch, which works well for what I had in mind. I cut the strips at 3.5″ wide and varying lengths ranging from 3.5″ for the smallest cool pieces to 21.5″ for the longest low volume strips. I knew I wanted to start with blues at the top, and wasn’t sure if I was going to head into purple or greens, until I put the Tula Pink space dust print at the end of the blues and I knew I had to pick out the greens in the orbs and head on from there. My colour progressions aren’t perfect, but I love it anyway, and Jess says she does too, which is what matters! I’d really love to have a whole quilt like this… add it to my neverending bucket list…. Although the good news for the prospects of such a quilt happening is that it’s really quite quick to make once you’ve decided on colours!!