Trees in nature and patchwork

Thank you so much for the lovely messages after my last post, I really did appreciate all your kind words and messages of sympathy. My trip to New Zealand gave me a much needed rest.

I had a lovely time catching up with family and especially spending time with my grand children. My DD has a lovely old farmhouse to live in with fabulous country views surrounding the property as you can see.

I really enjoyed seeing all the wonderful spring blossoms which we don't see as much of in the area where I live.

Even the trees that hadn't burst into life yet were a sight to behold.

Before I left for New Zealand, I had started making tree blocks for a new quilt. I love this process of slicing and dicing and not using precise piecing.

I had a stash of Kaffe Fassett shot cottons that were languishing in the cupboard and a container of Batiks that I thought I'd never use. They couldn't have been more perfect.

The method involves inserting strips of different sizes between the cuts and is pretty easy to do. The pattern is Twelve Trees by Helen Howes. There are many variations and settings you could use with these blocks.
There is a free tutorial showing how to make these blocks on Helen's site here and also Kelly over at Pinkadot Quilts has also shown a step by step process here.
I started by cutting my background rectangles 16 x 10 1/2"

I decided I liked the setting that Helen used for one of her quilts and followed suit, I have a few more blocks to do to make it to the 25 I had planned on. I'm such a copy cat but why change it when I love it so much.

Here's a peek at what appeared at the edge of my design wall. As if by magic really, I didn't intend to play with another new quilt but I wanted to cut a few pieces of fabric in these colours to see if I liked them. I do.

I have a few things on my list to do yet before I get to play some more.

Two squares cut 2.5" and one rectangle 6.5" x 2.5" if you're curious.

 

Until next time, Janet