this week

together three new rose stars 

blue

pink and brown with some of my family fabrics Dad's striped shirt and grandmother's scraps of pink

Green for Jeanne Grossman in CA :-)

Wow the weather in Washington DC went from mild spring like crocus and narcissus blooming to wintry winds and snow in a matter of hours yesterday. I was lucky to get home from my afternoon walk just before the blustering snow storm swept over the neighborhood. But the cold air makes me even more productive in short bursts. I have had a very productive week of English paper piecing my rose star blocks together and posting them on the Flickr. Rose Star Block party page and if you follow that link you can see hundreds of other rose star blocks by others in our group! I completed three new blocks this week and cut out a few more. I kept to my routine of writing in the mornings drawing a single sketch of something and water colored then photographed and edited and published on the web. I was invited to do an art show in Middleburg, Virginia late April and visited National Gallery of Art to see the new hanging of the French 19th Century collections as well as a great Early drawings of Picasso exhibition! That was very satisfying because a lot of Picasso seems scary to me. These early works were intimate and bold and very accomplished in a way I can relate to "reality". I also was lucky and got to go see a new film with Glenn Close  and Janet Mcteer Albert Nobbs a story of a woman who lived her life as a man in Dublin Ireland circa 1866 which was a short story that Close worked for 17 years to bring to the screen. I loved it and wish it were playing in more theaters so everyone had a chance to see.
This week the flower sketches are pink, magenta and purple, chilly colors for spring to winter.

new magenta tulips stand up straight and tall

second day there were tulips that snaked left and right and straight down towards the artist

magenta tulips turned purple and red and have fat yellow centers open wide bending all they way down to the shelf

Buddha kept an eye on the flowers on the book shelf

flowering quince blooming everywhere early now and hellebore

tulip magnolias burst out yesterday after cutting for ikebana in Manassas last week! 

Below individual photos of my earlier blocks for the Rose Star Block Party: 

white rose

black and white 

red and white

yellows 

orange purple blue garden photo inspired