History of Dead Birds

I was digging thru my tubs of miscellaneous dye samples and discarded unfinished projects when I stumbled upon this lovely piece of dyed cotton. I knew it was about time to pull it out and turn it into something but thought it would have to wait until after graduation when inspiration struck! I've been toying with my independent study final project of 3D quilting and here was just the fabric to get the gears rolling.
My desire was to do all my samples and final about suicide but who says it has to be human suicide?

A few months ago my husband came home from a hunting trip with a dried out dead bird. A fragile tiny baby bird that he kept safe in his truck ashtray for me. While unusual to some this was a true gift for a gal like me-the Ellie equivalent of a dozen red roses. This spurred a theme and not long after I found another dried out dead bird on my own, then even had a baby bird fall out of his nest right at my feet.
These occurances inspired me to even include a dead bird in my senior exhibition. (We all made a letter of our title FABRICATION and being one of the I's I wrapped a dead bird in wire and hung it up. Only one other classmate would touch it!)
Now with quite the collection of dead birds I needed a place for them to call home. During my trash collecting I found a perfect dead bird house!

So, dead birds, dead bird houses and then my recent spell of quilting disturbing interior spaces like the blue chair quilt...

looks nice and comfy but is actually screen printed with hand guns and the wall paper is filled with bombs while a live and dead rats cover the floor...
And I was running to some paper to sketch out ideas for a
Home For Dead Birds quilt.

Sketches in place, dead birds and bird house for inspiration I went back thru my fabric stash for pieces of vintage fabrics with prints that spoke of comfort and home. I also found a great color reference fabric whose dark blues referrenced bordering darkness and bright pink flowers were cheery and happy and dyed the other fabrics to match.
This is where it all begins...