Look, look!  I had such fun making this:

It's my block for the Love circle of do. Good Stitches, a charity quilting bee.  This month, Ara Jane asked us for tree blocks on white.  My head was spinning with so much freedom until I landed on a bowl full of hexagons that have been languishing in my kitchen...

I arranged the hexagons randomly on a white block and then sketched the tree trunks and branches in between with pencil.  Then, I removed the hexagons and machine stitched the outline of the trunk and branches in medium brown thread.  The idea to fill in the tree with free-form stitching came from Meg's book "Sew Liberated".  She makes some cool tree pillows with trunks like these.  Meg suggested free motion stitching using a stabilizer fabric underneath.  After some trial and error, I decided not to mess with stabilizer or free motion.  I stitched this with a simple clear presser foot.  It was quick and fun!  Last I machine appliqued the hexagons in place.

But, guess what, I need to make TWO blocks!  Hmm... what to do next?