Hello Little Bears Fans

Spending a day at the beach is one of my favorite things to do. So I love this month's theme!

Each month the Quilt Block Mania participating designers share a block pattern inspired by the month's theme. The pattern is free for the month. I'll be designing and giving away a block each month reflecting the Quilt Block Mania monthly theme, however, my block designs will also follow my Year of Bears theme. Collect all the blocks and make a quilt at the end of the year. If you missed any of the previous blocks, you can read about them on the blog HERE and visit my online shop to purchase.

➡️Year of Bears Quilt Block Pattern Series

The QBM theme for April is "Beach".

Sitting under a beach umbrella, Little Bear has his cool heart shaped sunglasses on and his favorite beach toys. 

Beach Bum Bear is the free 12" block pattern I'm giving this month. Details on how to get your free block pattern is at the bottom of this post. You will also find the links to all the other QBM participating designers. This block pattern will only be free to download for the month of April. 

**NOTE** This promotion has ended but the Beach Bum Bear PDF block pattern is available for purchase in my online shop.

I love bears' heart shaped sunglasses! Making them seemed a bit challenging at first, but it turned out to be fairly simple. I started by cutting out the templates of the outside heart shapes as one solid piece (the rims of the glasses). Using my starch method, I prepared my appliqué patches with the red fabric, again as one solid patch. Then using a fine tip, permanent black ink marker, I marked the inner heart shape (the glass portion) onto the red heart appliqué patches. Using a brush tip permanent black marker, I filled in the heart shapes covering the red fabric. I prefer to use Sakura Pigma Micron markers. After using any permanent marker, always press with a hot iron to heat set the dye. After the hearts were appliqued in place, I used a matching red embroidery floss to embroider the nose bridge on the glasses. Done! So cute! 

Bonus Block

Spring is in the air! I couldn't resist putting Little Bear out in the garden on a beautiful Spring day watering his flowers.