Bee Kind
Bee Kind was inspired by a tote bag I saw that had a picture of a bee and the word kind. I instantly knew I needed to make a quilt out of it! I changed the bee to a cartoon version rather than the complicated anatomically correct picture. I also thought that adding hexies (which are the shape of honeycombs) would be a great background. I machine pieced the background so that was easy and quick. I decided to fill the wings of the bee with a very simple collage of things that made me happy. Naturally the I in the word kind needed a heart for the dot. I was undecided about the eyes and antennae so I machine quilted the quilt after doing all of the fusible applique.
I machine quilted in a grid following the direction of the hexie patchwork lines. I started with grey thread but also added some white and yellow for fun. Once the quilt was quilted I added 2 buttons for each eye and sewed some rick rack for the antennae. I felt really good about the progress but wanted something special for the binding. I had a long car ride approaching (a teaching job in Arkansas) and I love to hand stitch while Chris drives and we listen to books on Audible. Hexies were the first idea and I wanted to make the shape of them really stand out. I sewed a 2” strip to the back of the quilt all the way around just like you would a binding if you were sewing it to the front. Then I stitched all of the hexies together and appliqued them to the front of the quilt. I then blind stitched the binding strip to the edge of the hexies by folding a cutting as needed. It makes a fun finished edge. There is probably a name for this technique but since I was just making it up as I went, I am not sure if mine is unique or not. I’ve never seen it done before, but it likely has been at some point.
And what could be more fun than a bee quilt on hexies? More bee quilts on hexies! I am doing a series that will have mix and match parts to interchange once the pattern is available. Currently I’m having too much fun with Bee Happy, which has a smile and different shaped wings filled with you guessed it… hexies!
Next is Bee Mine and then Bee Sweet. They will also have variations that can be swapped with the other bees so that the possibilities will bee fun! Oh and the shape of the quilt will change with each bee as well. So stay tuned to bee inspired!
Enjoy every stitch! Diane