So after last weeks semi serious rant on what I dislike strongly about quilting, I am sharing what I love. I think today being Easter and a wonderful day of joy and great happiness for me and others of many faiths I should share the good of my favorite (well other than reading) hobby/obsession. I know there are more than ten things I love so some are going to be groups of items…
1. Sharp new rotary cutter blades, new needles, and fresh scissors: Yes I hate replacing needles. Yet there is nothing more enjoyable about the beauty of the first few seams made by a fresh needle. Also I love how crisp a fresh blade makes the fabric cut. So perfect and even. The scissors; well I hide my scissors because for some reason my dear husband, whom I love more than words can say, likes to use my very expensive Gingher scissors to cut his goatee. Or cables for his computer/ wiring. (His defense is they are so sharp and strong…. well duh they are good fabric scissors.) So a good pair is heavenly.
2. Fabric: Ahhh… the colors, the feels of cotton. I do prefer cotton. But fabric with its diversity and design. I adore fabric. I can spend hours in a fabric store pondering what, I could do with nearly every single piece. I picture batiks in quilts for my Florida nad California living relatives. Brights in new quilts for the children. All the 1930’s prints for the new baby girls room. The delicate pastels and classic Modas in my own quilts. The rich Asian prints for my husband. The classic prints and Civil War lines for my male relatives. Even the tone on tones and white on whites inspire me. Fabric is so appealing it is not even funny.
3. Patterns, magazines, books, blogs… all the reading: I love to read. That is my first passion. But the chance to read about my second passion… pure delight. I love nothing better to open a fresh magazine and read it cover to cover; often reading even the patterns word by word. I love to read what new item are available, what tips and ideas others have come up with and even better to get a chance to see the new colors and patterns that are going to be big in fabric. I love reading blogs to see what other quilters are doing. I love books because I can find so many great ideas of future projects that I can go a little crazy. Even better are books that are not specifically quilt books but within them you find quilts. Perhaps only briefly mentioned as a covering on a bed but I love these found bits of quilting.
4. Moda bake shop: I loved baked goods. That is not the point here. I also as I said before hate making the first cuts. The joy of Moda nad their precuts has changed my life. I know other fabric lines carry them but I love to go directly to the source of all that madness. I think what I love even better than the fact the majority of cutting is done is that you get a whole line in one touch. I can create a beautiful quilt that looks scrappy but at the same time it works in terms of value and placement. I have many books and plans featuring these wonderful friends that I could get lost for years in just the bake shop.
5. The Redwork resurgence: This is to me my favorite classic trend in quilting. Right here, any modernism that I appear to try to have collapses. This is to me one of the most traditional aspects of quilting. And I love it!!! I started in embroidery. I love that once again it has become a huge part of the quilting process. It combines my roots with the joy I find in quilting. I want to thank the person who brought the beautiful new patterns out to the forefront of quilting and made this popular again. Thank you.
6. Hand Applique, and binding: I do not hand quilt. Well I could but I like to finish at least a few quilts a year. I do enjoy handwork. (I could write a whole blog post just about hand work and I may in the near future… since my handwork time triples once the boys get back in sports for the season. All that time sitting at practices is great to do handwork.) I love to do hand applique, and even enjoy turn under. I am not as good as I wish I was but that is only a matter of time and practice. Since I do all my bindings myself these days, I have grown more fond of them. I think again that I really am beginning to enjoy the chance to not only complete a project that is so near to being done you can taste completion!!! Also as any parent of small children will agree, any chance to sit on the couch and watch a movie is great. I almost never sit down for a few uninterrupted hours and a binding that needs to be done is a wonderful reason.
7. Freshly completed blocks, or each step of the creation (except borders): I love the quilting/sewing part. I love how you go from piles of squares and triangles and create something beautiful. I think this is why I appreciate the joy of 30 minutes of quilting (which I have been bad about doing recently.) I can admire the small steps more. I can really see how the strips look together, or how a single flying geese looks. I notice all the details, and it is wonderful. Just wonderful. Though the completed quilt is a wonderful moment, I love all the pieces and parts that go together in it.
8. My box of some days: UFOs and PhDs are one thing (unfinished objects and projects half done for those who are not in the know) but the joy of taking a pattern I like and putting the fabric with it… that is glee. I think it’s the feeling of possibility of having a plan ready to go. I also think it is the anticipation. It is like when you lay out the ingredients to bake cookies, you can almost taste the finished cookies all warm and yummy. (Hmmm… cookies, fresh-baked cookies…)
9. The homemade touch to gift giving: I read somewhere once; that you should only gift quilts or quilted items to those who will appreciate them in an appropriate way. The article continued on to discuss making sure the benefactors knew the “right” way to display, use, store, and care for a quilt. They even continued on to discuss only giving them to those who understood exactly the great pains that go into quilting. Once I had finished laughing my eyes out trying to picture who, if anyone, I knew who would really be that perfect person, I knew that was not where I was going with my gifts. I make many quilts as gifts. I know that they may not be used the way they should (my brother has a tendency to use them as curtains on big windows to create privacy… talk about completely sun faded backs… and did I mention he uses nails to hold them up?) Yet there is not one happier then him to receive a new quilt. I get more hugs from him than I imagine possible. Give a quilt to a child and you know it will be used as a tent, ate on, played on and who knows what else… Give one as a wedding one, and well nine months after that quilt goes on a bed, you are giving one for a new baby… I love to see quilts used. I love to make them to be used. I would rather have to make them a new quilt because they used it to death, than to have one quilt last them forever. I love giving wall hangings and table runners to teachers as Christmas gifts. I always feel that since they take so much of their time on my child I can give them some of my time and talent as a gift. I love baby quilts as gifts. I find joy in wall hangings for holiday presents, or wedding showers, or just for a birthday gift! I love that because I give away so many quilts I can work with different colors, patterns, and sizes then I would ever use if I was making them just for my household.
10. Quilts, quilts, everywhere.. I spy a quilt: I love, love to see quilts. I think what I love most about quilting is the great joy and connection I get in seeing quilts. I love seeing them in my house from the true lovers knot that was our wedding ring, to my sons (and my the anytime now new baby girl) crib quilts, to the ones we hang on the walls, and the doors. I love to admire the dick and jane fabric quilts that I have created for the boys and have enough of the fabric to make a fourth quilt in that series. I love the ones that fill a box, and are used as back ups to the ones on the bed. I love them!!! Yet even better, are seeing store samples and admiring others color choices and level of talent. I love going to a class or a meeting and seeing other creations shared at show and tell. I love shows. I was going to Paducah this year until new one decided to come along. (In fact, I had even convinced my non-sewing husband to come along. I appealed to his sense of manly pride as a helper for all the elderly ladies who quilt… he was all excited like a boy scout and an old lady on a street corner.) I love to see them. And I love to spy them. I get great joy out of visiting a random person and seeing that they have a quilt. I adore watching a movie and seeing a quilt on a bed. I love it even more when I recognize the pattern. This is what makes quilting so very thrilling. It is a secret society that plays “I spy” together. We find joy in looking at the same pattern a million times and unlike an unconcerned observer enjoy the repeat. We recognize each others mistakes and perhaps love what we see even more for it.
So that is what I love about quilting. It has inspired my quilting this week. I have completed more, and now have at least two projects at the point of needing to pay them special attention. So since, I have no kids tomorrow: add binding to baby quilt and piece back to husbands quilts… ohh and cut and cut and cut…
quiltingin900sqft 