The Four Seasons

For the upcoming Marathon Quilter's Guild show, I made these four wall hangings in seasonal colors. Members of the guild are making these to hang together, all the winters, all the falls, all the summers and all the springs. The effect should be a gradual wash of seasonal color.

The cardinal in the winter quilt is printed on fabric from a watercolor by my husband, Darryl Abbey. If you're on our Christmas card list, you might recognize it. The binding and strips that separate the different sections are of a satin fabric that is the perfect grey-blue winter sky color. The text printed below the cardinal says, "When cardinals appear, angels are near".

For fall I appliqued leaves on a background of sunflowers and goldfinches. Printed on the leaves is this poem by Margaret Wise Brown.

The Leaves Fall Down

One by one

the leaves fall down.

From the sky come falling

one by one.

and leaf by leaf

the summer is done.

One by one

by one by one.

I love a good beach sunset, so for the summer quilt I tried to depict the sun on the horizon and the sandy beach in the foreground. I may stitch in a few birds in the sky and some seashells on the beach. Summer can't come soon enough for me. I can't wait to bury my toes in the sand.

And finally, Spring. The focus of this piece is an embroidery done by my mother-in-law, Marion Abbey. I have a bin of beautiful crocheted and embroidered pieces by her and my grandmother that I am determined to give new life in future quilt projects. You can see my first attempt at this in a previous post titled Grandma's Embroidery and Crochet.