Ideas

I've been thinking about the idea of community and what it means to me. The first thing that comes to mind is neighborhood. We live in a "master planned" subdivision that is designed to foster community. Every house is within walking distance of a small park or playground. We have big community events like an Easter Egg hunt, fire works display for Fourth of July and Tree Lighting Ceremony at Christmas. We have one elementary school where all the kids in the neighborhood attend.

We love lots of things about living here. There are also drawbacks. It's easy to feel isolated. It doesn't always feel very diverse. I fear that some people outside of the subdivision may have some negative stereotypical views about the kind of people who live here. Some of those stereotypes are probably deserved.

As all this was swirling around in my head, I considered using a map of our "community" as the basis for the design of my quilt. I found some great images online.I converted a pdf to a jpeg and then zoomed into a particularly interesting area and I divided it into four six inch squares. I printed them out, cut them out and taped them together to make a 12 inch square. Then I traced the main lines onto a sheet of WU release paper with some sharpies.
I like the curvy street lines and all the tiny boxes lined up next to each other which represent each lot. I was still really just playing with the design. I didn't like the large empty area on my drawing. That's the golf course in real life. I had no plan for constructing the quilt. I considered reverse applique, fusing (of course), painting, hand carved stamps.

I was not feeling motivated or inspired. I've since abandoned this whole map idea and moved onto other images. I guess it's all part of the process.