No one expects March in the Maritimes to have days of 27 - 30 degrees temperatures. But, this week we reached the highest recorded temperatures in 50 years! The snow has melted, the trees are budding, skin has been bared. Folks of all shapes and sizes walked their dogs, ran, rode their bikes and breathed deep. Tonight the sunset filled the sky with shades of pink and coral and made it so hard to believe all this will come crashing to an end with low temperatures and snowfall predicted for early next week. Sigh.....

One of the projects of an art quilt group I am a member of was journal quilts. We chose the size of 8.5 by 11 inches and the theme? Well, it really doesn’t matter because one of our rules has always been to break the rules and make them our own! If there must be a theme, mine was focused on using a variety of surface design techniques in each journal quilt.

In this quilt I used hand dyed fabric as my base, then painted fabric for the centre of the “sun”. The rays of the sun were another painted fabric cut into pieces, sewn on the base and then I added detail work with 3D Fashion paint - the kind that you squeeze out of a bottle. The water was more hand dyed fabric with some strategically placed quilting lines.

Detail of sun and rays

When the air once again becomes chilly and I tuck my shorts to the back of the closet for another few months, I think I will keep this quilt on my desk as a reminder that warmer days do happen. And that I need to enjoy them as they come, when they come.