Quilting “First Green”

I have started quilting a new piece I am calling “First Green.”  I created the leaves by first piecing green and black strips, then cutting these strips on a diagonal, and sewing them to the center vein. I appliqued the leaves to a black background, then cut them out and appliqued them to the blue background. All of these fabrics are batiks, and it is about 24" x 42". 

I will be donating this piece to the Alzheimer’s Art Quilt Initiative when it is done. This fabulous organization has raised more than $713,000 for education and research since January 2006. They auction and sell donated quilts, and also sponsor a nationally touring exhibition of quilts about Alzheimer’s. Ami Simms of Flint, Michigan, is the founder and executive director. I’ve had the pleasure of meeting her at International Quilt Festival several times, and she is one amazing woman!

I am having a lot of fun quilting this piece. I started by adding straight lines to indicate the veins on the leaves, and to play up the lines and pump up the graphic quality of this piece. Now I am using different free-motion designs within the veins.

The name of this piece comes from one of my favorite poems by American poet Robert Frost:

Nothing Gold Can Stay

by Robert Frost

Nature’s first green is gold, 

Her hardest hue to hold.

Her early leaf’s a flower

But only so an hour. 

Then leaf subsides to leaf. 

So Eden sank to grief.

So dawn goes down to day.

Nothing gold can stay.