My interest in quilting begins...

I enjoyed that first quilt for several years without making any other quilts. About the time that my mother expressed an interest in starting to make quilts, I received a crafting catalog that had quilt kits in it. There were two that I liked so I ordered them. When they finally arrived, I was a bit disappointed. The fabric had already been cut into strips (width of fabric). And, I'm not sure, but I think the fabric was not 100% cotton. At least, it had a kind-of stiff feeling to it that I didn't care for. I did make one of the kits and realized that the quilt was not as big as I would like for my bed. So I went to the fabric store and hunted up some kind of fabric that would do as a border (which was not included in the kit, what was up with that?). I did get the quilt top finished. And it was large enough (barely) to use on my bed. Not quilted, just tied. I don't have a photo of this quilt because I don't have it anymore (I hadn't started photographing my quilts yet).

The other kit stayed a kit for maybe 10-15 years before I finally made it. It didn't have any border fabric, either. So I made do with what I could find at a quilt shop. It is definitely *not* the second (or even third) quilt that I ever made. But it was one of my first quilt-related purchases.



After I finished it, I thought that I would probably give it away. But I think it has grown on me. I will probably make a final decision after it gets machine-quilted by a professional longarmer. If I were making this quilt from a pattern and I were using the same colors, I would probably make sure that there were different sizes/visual textures to the different colored-fabrics. But, still, when it is finished, it will keep someone warm, whether me or someone else.

As for the first quilt that *I* planned (pattern, fabric, etc), that was from a pattern that was eventually called "A Winning Hand" (a variation of "Card Trick"). The pattern had not yet been published by Quilt in a Day. The class I took may have been used as testers for the final pattern. Mackie, the author of the published book, was teacher for the class I took at QIAD. This is the first quilting class I ever took, and where I started learning the "hows" of making a quilt, like a 1/4 inch seam, rotary cutting, etc.



It's awfully pink, isn't it. The background is a solid, but the sashing is tone-on-tone. One of the "cards" in the blocks is a solid. And with this quilt, I learned that tone-on-tone reads as solid from even a short distance. So if I stand back just a little, I see what looks like a lot of "solid". Even so, I still like this quilt. The floral fabric remains one of my favorite fabrics. This quilt was finished using the "birthing" technique that I learned at QIAD, and then was tied all over.

The back of this quilt has its own story: I thought I had bought enough fabric for a backing. What I did not take into account is that once I was ready to add borders I wanted the quilt to be larger than the pattern specified (I like extra length hanging down the sides of my bed). When I started to cut/piece the plain light pink fabric for a back, I, uhhhh, mmmm, well..... To put it bluntly, there was just not *quite* enough fabric for the entire back of the quilt. Oh, shoot! Now what to do? I pondered, and thought, and pondered some more. Eventually, if I recall correctly, my eyes fell on the extra squares of the fabric that I had used on the front. Hmmm.... Is there some way I can make use of those? I wonder.... What if... "Racing stripes?" Would that work? So I did a little figuring, and, YES! it will work. The result:



Some few years ago, I decided that I would like it to be quilted and decided to hand quilt it. I just started hand quilting 1/4" away from the seams of the "cards" on the inside of the cards. Ooops! When I look at the quilting from the back, it looked like a swastika. Yikes! Out came all the hand quilting. Thank goodness it was only one block.

I have not (yet) revisited the idea of hand-quilting this quilt; it remains tied.

By the time this quilt top was finished, I was hooked. I knew I would be making more quilts.

Kathy

History of my quilting

I just finished taking photos of my quilts and uploading them to Webshots. I had already uploaded some, and today I uploaded photos of 18 quilts that I made (or planned) and another 5 quilts that were made by others. While taking the photos, I decided that I wanted to describe the history/background/decision-making/lesson learned behind each quilt.

However, if I try to do this all at once, the blog post will be *huge*. So, instead, I will take them one by one, in as much in order that they were made as I can remember.

Ready for some history?

MY VERY FIRST QUILT!

I was at my Grandmother's house and she was cleaning out and getting rid of "stuff". She unearthed a quilt that her mother had made. It was truly falling apart. Many of the seams had come apart ( and it was easy to see that she used a blanket for the batting!). It really was in bad shape. My grandmother was going to throw it out. ACK!!! "Noooooo", I objected. I couldn't imaging throwing out a quilt made by my great-grandmother. I figured, "I know how to sew. So I can save parts of this quilt by making (re-making) it." Keep in mind that I had never made a quilt before. Here's a photo of this quilt after I finished it:



Looking back, here's what I remember (some some of the techniques that I would probably not use today [otherwise known as "mistakes"]):

I decided to save the "flowers" from the quilt, so I carefully removed all of them. However, some of those flowers were also falling apart, so I let those go to trash. When I finally had my stash flowers, I needed new background fabric for them. I when to my local fabric shop (I didn't know that there existed anything known as "quilt shop"). I looked all over that fabric shop for a plain white fabric. Arrrrggghhh! Could not find any. All right, next best thing was white fabric that had woven texture. (today I would shudder at this) I bought a bunch, took it home, and cut it into squares. Then I started re-appliqueing the flowers, using the same blanket stitch to attach the flowers, duplicating what my great-grandmother had done.

Eventually, all the blocks were finished and I got them all sewed together. Hmmmm. What in the world am I going to do about fabric for the back of the quilt? Fabric doesn't come that wide. (I don't know about *then*, but I know it now comes as wide as 120", more than wide enough. But, I digress.) Ah-hah! I know! I'll use a sheet! So off I went to find a queen size flat sheet in a lovely peachy-orange color. I used my grandmother's living room floor to layer everything. Then came the hand-quilting. Yes, folks, I hand-quilted this baby. I threaded up my needle just like I always did when sewing clothes: a nice length of thread, doubled-up with both ends used to make a nice knot! (Ummmm, that was *not* a quilter's knot. It was both ends of the thread wrapped around the end of one finger and then *rolled* off the finger into a large, ugly knot. Now I know that real quilters use a single length of thread, with a tiny knot that can be pulled into the middle of the quilt "sandwich". Oh, well.) I had one hand under the quilt and one hand on top and I quilted that quilt using the same hand motions that I used for needlepoint. (Of course, that resulted in the stitches on the back of the quilt being all different sizes and going in all different directions!) Oh, and I used a ruler and lead pencil to draw lines on the blocks so I would know where to quilt. And then came my final problem: How will I finish the edges of my quilt? (think, ponder, more thinking) Ohhhh! I know! All I need to do is fold the excess sheet over the top of my quilt, tuck the edges under, and stitch it down (thus making a border-binding). I even mitered my corners. I was so proud of that quilt when it was finished.

I refuse to be ashamed of the mistakes. After all, I didn't know any better. Besides, even with mistakes, that quilt still provides warmth at night; and a "perfect" quilt would not be any warmer than this one. I just refer to it as my "quilt with character". And, best of all, I have preserved something from my great-grandmother's quilt.

Kathy