once upon a time... {in a forest}

How hard to realize that every camp of men or beast has this glorious starry firmament for a roof! In such places standing alone on the mountaintop, it is easy to realize that whatever special nests we make — leaves and moss like the marmots and the birds, or tents or piled stone — we all dwell in a house of one room — the world with the firmament for its roof -- and are sailing the celestial spaces without leaving any track. 

John Muir,  John of the Mountains:  The Unpublished Journals of John Muir (1938)

...And wilderness week is finally winding down ;)  {Not a moment too soon!}

Short story short, I stumbled across this quote by self-proclaimed "poetico-trampo-geologist-botanist and ornithologist-naturalist etc. etc. !!!!" John Muir while perusing outdoors-inspired prose the other week.  And fell in love.  And decided to incorporate it into this quilt.

Short story long, I always wanted my muted forest to feel like a storytime quilt, but otherwise I had absolutely no idea how to go about assembly or quilting (and that was assuming my machine could manage the wicked thick seams to begin with!).  Once I abandoned the original Ringle/Kerr "Once upon a time" layout concept, I decided to preserve the narrative spirit of that design by using some sort of "text quilting."  

I quilted the letters (helvetica neue black condensed) using Aurifil 2000 (blocks+borders were pieced using 2024).

Alas, how quickly it occurred to me that I had no idea what that text should say.  I suppose I could've composed an original tale, but {fortunately} I first consulted google and found someone (read:  a legend) who captured my sentiments better than I ever could have hoped to.  

Those black+white striped stamen (I think that's what they are?) might be my favorite detail.

To me, Mr. Muir's words deeply resonate with my philosopher-environmentalist soul.

But I know they're not for everyone.

(When I read this to my dad, he paused for a moment before responding, "Well what the heck is that about?"  ...We're alike in too many ways to count, he and I, but really, sometimes I'm more like the orange that fell from an apple tree.)

I cut 12" triangles from some leftover strip-pieced sections used to "frame" each block, and paired them with my go-to organic bamboo goodness.
...Then I realized I had omitted the final border from my calculations and added some opal owl grain in violet ;)

So if you, too, are less than moved by the message, I hope you'll still enjoy the imagery:  a camp of forest creatures surrounded by one glorious {stitched} starry sky for a roof:

The end. ;)

Edited to note:  I've moved the pre-quilting close-ups here and have updated the remainder of this post with new photographs.