Spring (I hope)

 

Earlier this week I took down my winter quilts and replaced them with my spring quilts.  It was an act of faith as it was trying very hard to snow and the temperature was still quite cold accompanied by a stinging wind.

A tulip quilt created many years ago still signals spring to me.  Tulips are a reoccurring theme in my quilting.  I love creating pieces with flowers as the theme.  The one at the top of today’s blog features a favourite – tulips.  Tulips signal spring, a rebirth. This small tulip piece was one I started in a workshop with Susan Shie of Turtle Moon Quilts.  Susan fills in the spaces in her quilts with information, things she want to share or remember.  So this wee quilt uses some of my favourite sayings about tulips and spring and the promise fulfilled.

I alert you in advance about my love of flowers because you will hear from time to time in this space about another favourite flower.  It would be very hard for me to priorize a list beginning with my most favourite but tulips are certainly up there for an early spring flower.

Yesterday I went out to one of my flower beds to see if there were signs of my crocus, the first flower blooming in my garden and usually very early in April.  Nothing!.  Just absolutely frozen ground.  Today when I came home this afternoon I glanced at the bed and noticed green, a swath of green shoots nearly ⅓” high that are one of my tulip      plantings.

Today I spent the day starting to create a piece that will be another early flower put into my garden  –  pansies I know that pansies will take a few degrees of frost so I have the out as early as I dare to enjoy the smiling velvet faces.

So yes, I am ready and my tulips are ready and the temperature is creeping up and on Monday I will revert to walking in the river valley.