Remember the Hunter's Star quilt I started for my sister last October? 

A new pattern is required.  And quite accidentally, I find it through a merry link trail on Reddit! 

Since the first time I saw a Storm at Sea quilt (at a quilt show, with intertwined hearts emerging from the pattern through clever use of color), I wanted to make one.  I love how it's all straight lines, but because of angle changes gives the illusion of curving lines.  It does look like waves, but made from squares and rectangles.  The kaleidoscope block has a similar appeal. 

Some quilts -- like my Memories of Africa Quilt or my Dandelion quilt -- start with a plan.  I sit down and draw an idea, pick my fabrics, and work my way toward a fore-visioned end.  I love working like that, because I can bring an idea into reality!  But those quilts tend to be thinky quilts, and sometimes I don't have the reserves to think my way through my hobby.  Lately, I've been getting home from work at 6:30pm, and it's dark, and I have just enough space in my brain for a little Foundation Paper Piecing... before I feel my focus slip, like a car falling out of gear.  I get maybe a half-hour of concentration, and then I find myself picking the wrong fabric for the pattern and having to rip seams, or just staring at the same piece for a while doing nothing.  I desire to be creative, but sewing to a plan leads to frustration. 

That's why I like to have a second project at the same time, a non-thinky project.  The Acid Trip, Scrappy Double Wedding Ring, and today's featured project are all examples of what I think of as "blank verse" projects. 

My mom and I did two tours and one friend-visit while we were in Africa.  The first tour, The Great Rift Valley, was a safari, and we camped outside many nights.  Here's my mom and I at home in Pennsylvania, ready to set out:

New Year is a good time to--like the Roman god Janus--look both backward and forward. 

("Crater" sounds like something you might know you're in, but Ngorongoro Crater, being 161.557 square miles, is so big that except for the moment when you're on the lip about to drive down, you don't really feel like you're in a crater.)

As for pictures, if I'm not using my own work, I seek photos under free public licenses.  In today's post, however, I use one photo without permission (because I have no idea how to get permission).  But then I mangle it beyond recognition in the pursuit of design, so I'm not sure where copyright law falls on that one!  Nevertheless, I still do my best to credit the originator and link back. 

Now that I quilt, I see quilt patterns everywhere. Like in the pebble-mosaic walkways of the Lan Su Chinese Garden in Portland, Oregon!  Incidentally, that garden is beautiful, but in the interest of isolating patterns for blogging, I took some very boring pictures of it when I visited on November 15th, this year.