a quick update

The end of April/first of May has been a little crazy, but I've managed to get quite a bit done. I'm working hard on two tutorials to post soon, and I hope to have at least one up by the end of the week, so stay tuned!

I had several Bee blocks due at the end of the month, two for TwitterB and two for the 12 Days of Christmas Bee. (The second for TwitterB was actually optional, but I chose to do it.)

Here are the TwitterB blocks, made for Jessica:

They are ticker-tape blocks, and this is my first try at it. As you probably guessed, this is the first tutorial I'm working on. It was a lot of fun, even though it was quite different than any block I have ever worked on.

The next set are for Jodie as part of the 12 Days of Christmas bee:

I made the star by using the Starflower Block tutorial over at Ellison Lane Quilts.  I played with it a bit in that I only made one block and her directions are for two.  Normally, I would have done two blocks for efficiency, but Jodie specifically requested two different blocks and she also asked us to not use additional fabrics.  In hindsight, I had enough of the colored prints leftover to make a second block for myself, but I didn't want to chance it going in.

The tree block is my own, and it is the second tutorial that I mentioned.  It was fun to figure out a block from scratch...I'm slowly developing a fondness for graph paper and pencils...LOL!

My apologies (again!) for the horrid lighting in these pictures.  I hope to have that resolved soon as a electrician friend of mine has agreed to install some lighting for me.  Woohoo!

In other news, I have four more blocks done on Jane's Black and White Quilt and the yard is looking better. Hubby planted all of our new plants yesterday and we'll have pine needles down by the end of the week. He tried to do that yesterday, too, but the man we buy them from wasn't home. Even with the black fabric, though, it still looks better. Will be sure to post a final pic.

Have a great hump-day!