Aussie Modern Instabee – March

It’s been a bit quiet over here, I’ve been a busy little bee and there’s lots to share with you all. Rather than hanging out here, I’ve been building the website for Australia’s 1st Modern Quilt Show presented by the Wollongong Modern Quilt Guild, and helping out on the committee for that, it’s all very exciting and I’ll have more on that soon.

I also just spent an amazing weekend learning from Kathy Doughty from Material Obsession, in a two day modern wedge workshop. She’s one amazing woman and gave me a bit of a kick in the pants to enter the Under 35s Quilt Competition so I hope to share my quilt progress for that to.

Aussie Modern InstabeeSomething else new for me that I wanted to share is the Aussie Modern Instabee! Back in February I saw a few posts on Instagram about organising hives for a quilt bee based on the book Modern Bee by Lindsay Conner similar to those happening in the states. I haven’t joined a bee before as I was worried that I wouldn’t be able to keep up and that my work wouldn’t be to a standard where I could make things for other people. I tried a block of the month last year and got a few months in but didn’t really have anything pushing me to get the blocks done, it’s not that I didn’t enjoy making them and I hope to finish them off but I need a little more concrete motivation. After checking out the book I decided to put my hand up and give this bee a go.

The Aussie Modern Instabee (#aussiemoderninstabee) has been organised by the awesome Lisa Chambers (@chambsvacc) who has pulled together 6 or 7 hives of 12 people each to take part in this awesome bee (there are 10 or more hives in this bee in the US)! Rather than it being 1 persons month to receive all their blocks, it’s been organised as a round robin, where each month everyone makes a block for someone else, which means we’re all working on different blocks and everyone gets a block each month. I’m in hive 3 and you can find all our blocks and chatter on Instagram with the hashtag #aussiemoderninstabeehive3, while you’re there you can find me @pescapresents

I’ve chosen the Mosiac Tiles block and have requested bright jewel tones ranging from greens through blues, purple, pinks & reds against a scrappy low volume background. You can see my example block below.

Aussie Modern Instabee - Mosaic Tiles Test Block

Here’s the first block I received in March from the lovely Natasha.

Aussie Modern Instabee - Mosaic Tiles Block - March

The first block on my list to make was the Come Together block, this one is a monster finishing at 20.5″ square (20″ square once in the quilt), so with just 12 blocks you get a 60″ x 80″ quilt. I’m making a test block for each different block design in my own fabric scheme just to make sure I get it before I make my partners blocks. I quite enjoyed this one and really love the size. Here’s my block in jewel tones & low volume.

Aussie Modern Instabee - March - Come Together Block Tester

And here’s the block for my partner Alex who supplied the greys so that all her blocks match at the joins, and requested aquas, teals, navy with a bit of mustard yellow and a white background. I hope you like it Alex!

Aussie Modern Instabee - March - Come Together Block

I’m really looking forward to trying out the variety of blocks, I think our bee only has 2 double ups across the book so there will be plenty of new skills to learn.