Journal Quilt for May

My theme for my journal quilts this year is "birds and trees." The first three months I concentrated on trees and only added an incidental bird. Last month the birds were more important but not central. This month I'm thinking of my morning visitors, the Canadian geese who summer in our town as do so many Bostonians and others. The geese arrive on the lawn quite early, 6:00-ish. They graze and poop until mid-morning. I think they eat grass but I think they mostly look for bugs. They're quite regal and well integrated into community life, nothing fazes them. This year I rarely see more than 6 or 8 and often only 2 or 4 a day. Last summer I once counted over 30 all at once.

The paper pieced pattern I used is from Margaret Rolfe, an Australian quilter whose book of paper pieced American birds [mostly] and animals was the first paper piecing book I ever bought. It did not have very good or extensive directions for the piecing and my first attempts were pretty awkward. This was probably 12, maybe more like 15 years ago. I've made a number of her designs and, of course, gone on to love paper piecing, especially stars [as in the black and pink quilt a couple of posts ago.

In this quilt the trees are simply the upper strip of fabric which indicates the trees across the way that are a kind of background for my avian friends. My only quilting on this journal piece is outlining the goose. Unusually, I used fluffy batting so that makes the goose more three dimensional than usual. S/he has a button for an eye.

They're Back, Harbingers of Spring

This week the Canadian geese returned. I think they probably winter in the Chesapeake Bay area. First there were six and then eleven and then thirteen. First the grass was not covered in snow. Then for three days rain and snow alternated, with a thin white cover each morning. They were undaunted, they searched for green shoots under the dry brown top layer and under the snow. They are not fat but they are not thin either; they have taken good care o themselves and had enough to eat, even if they did have to flap their wings for three or four hundred miles. Today the snow is gone again, the sun is brilliant. I saw a robin scurrying on the lawn. If it stays nice the forsythia will begin to open. Spring is always a time of rejoicing. Yes I know it will come and in a sense I take that assurance for granted but the beauty today after the gray, wet, chill of most of the week is glorious.