004

I'm revisiting the quilts of my past, and I'm still in the fall of 2005.  This baby quilt was completed just two weeks after quilt no. 003. 

My husband and I were invited to a couples baby shower for one of his coworkers at the time.  Quiltmaking was still so new and exciting to me that I couldn't bear to pick a gift from their registry - I had to explore a new idea, a new pattern.  Lord knows I needed a break from the log cabin pattern!

I could critique my fabric choices now, but I see the progression in learning as I look back and that is a precious thing.  I was growing and evolving with every new project.  In present-day quiltmaking, that's still my goal.

I cross-hatched the background, but what I was trying to feature in this photo was the "E" I quilted in the middle of the star block.  The baby's name was Elizabeth and I wanted to personalize the quilting.  It's not highly visible, but again, I tried a new thing and I learned from that experience.

I used stencils to pull off the butterfly border and I also see that I hand-tacked the binding down on the back side of the quilt.

Life is life.  People come into our tiny corner of the world and then leave it, sometimes it is us leaving them.  Honestly, we were not very close friends with the family this quilt went to and in a few short years, we lost touch with them completely.  Job changes, moves, life just happens and we move on.  It's a touch sad, mostly it's just a reality.  This situation is not unique, in fact, there will be a lot of quilts on my list that will bring back memories - only memories - of a passing friendship.  But not a single regret. 

003

I'm revisiting the quilts of my past, one by one [for now].  There's a strong to quite-strong chance that no one else will be interested in this retelling of history, but dang it - it's my journal, and I really want to know a number.

The year was still 2005, it was the fall and another friend of mine was having her first child.  Judging by the color scheme I chose, they didn't yet know the gender of the lil one at the time. 

This quilt marked a turning point for me, and an important one. It was the first quilt I solely machine quilted.  I took a domestic machine quilting class just prior to piecing the top and I COULD NOT WAIT to apply the techniques I'd learned to make this quilt better than my last two quilts.  The information I learned in the class  was such a difference maker!

Ready for the worst quality pictures in the history of the Internet?

Yeah, I can't even believe I just published those. :)  Let's just let that be a commentary on the times (again, it was 2005) and my enthusiasm for moving onto the next quilt and not caring about the photography. (Okay, I do wish I had cared a little bit about the photography.)

002

Part of me is thinking, "You're not really going to go through your quilt pictures and blog about them one at a time, are you?"  The answer is: I'm not sure.  Maybe?

What's this? Another log cabin quilt thanks to Eleanor Burns's Quilt in a Day book?  Guilty!  Why mess with a good thing?

This was made for a childhood friend of mine who was having her first baby - a girl.  And our school colors were purple and gold - did I really purposefully choose our school colors?  I honestly don't remember.  It's a good combo, nonetheless. 

Another thing I keep saying to myself: "Bless your heart, Jess".  I don't know if that translates well, but I'm so proud of my beginner self trying new techniques, even if they aren't executed that well.

Maybe you can see from the photo above, I both tied and machine quilted this baby quilt.  I had a little pucker in the machine quilting, but I wasn't too worried about it. :) I also see that I did a binding instead of turning it like a pillowcase.  Again: points for trying, young one.

I totally remember being thrilled with finding the most appropriate, fitting backing fabric.

Baby quilts are my favorite thing to make.  It's because of the size mostly.  Being able to try out a new idea on a smaller scale without the same time/resource investment as a full size quilt.  But still the act of giving a gift for a new life - it just doesn't get better in my opinion. 

001

This was my first finished quilt.  Not the first one I started - mind you - the first one I completed. :)  The one I first started is still a UFO.

In the spring of 2005, I gave up working an office job I really liked.  I left for another job I ended up really liking too - it was a working from home gig called M-o-m. :) One of my former coworkers-turned-friend got married in the fall of 2005.  At the time, I was just discovering patchwork and becoming enamored with fabrics and pattern - I couldn't wait to finish my first quilt.  I saw my friend Josh's wedding as an opportunity to gift a quilt of my own to the happy couple.  Having a deadline definitely helped me see the project through to completion.

Following Eleanor Burns's Quilt in a Day Log Cabin book, I made the blocks shown above and really had a good time arranging them into different configurations.  I landed on the layout shown and sewed the top together.  And then I honestly looked at it and thought -- okay, why isn't it a quilt yet?!  Why doesn't it look like the one my sister made for me?  I hadn't actually considered that the quilt I'd made was really just a quilt top.  I had no idea how to finish it, so I called my sister who I knew had pulled off a finished quilt at least twice before.

I found a flat sheet on sale at Bed, Bath & Beyond and used it for the backing fabric.  I bought one of the standard polyester high-loft batts from Joann's.  I sewed the three layers together around the perimeter and left a hole to turn that mother out, pillowcase-style.  It worked!  For the finishing touch, and to add much needed stability, I tied embroidery floss through the layers all over the quilt.

It's funny that I don't have any pictures of the finished quilt.  The only two pictures I do have look exactly like the one above.  I didn't care about photography, that's for sure.  And honestly? I was probably in too big of a rush to finish before the wedding that I didn't have time to stop and take more pictures.  That sounds more like me.

Inspiration for quiltmaking

My paternal great-grandmother was a quilter.  I still have faint memories from my very early childhood of visiting her house and seeing a big, wooden quilt frame set up in her living room for hand quilting.

Great Grandma Estelle made my sister, brother and myself quilts from fabrics we definitely recognized - they were also used by my mom in making clothes for us.  Because of these warm memories, I've always had a fondness for quilts.  My Grandpa Bob made me a hanging quilt rack for my bedroom and I loved it - I probably asked for it in the first place. :)  I remember displaying my quilt that had come from Grandma Estelle and being proud of it.

Flash forward several years to when my husband and I were newly married.  My sister Emily  made a quilt for us.  She is a couple of years younger than me and I was 22 at the time.  Emily knew how to make a quilt because our small, rural high school had offered a class in quiltmaking.  It wasn't available when I was a student, but there was enough interest in Emily's class to have it be a home ec option.  I believe it was called Independent Quilting. Now that I look back on it, I think it's pretty incredible that our school offered that class!  It really changed the course of my life if I'm being honest, and I didn't even take the class.

Present-day quilt, wrinkles and all.  To say this quilt is loved is an understatement.  It's been loved to death - this is its best side.  I've had it folded  next to my couch for several months now with the hopes of restoring it - patching the rips and tears it's sustained over the last twelve years and then quilting it.

My sister gifting us this quilt introduced the possibility that I could also make quilts.  Emily helped me with shopping to get my initial quilting supplies and when I was ready to start my own quilt project we sewed blocks together, going through Eleanor Burns's Log Cabin Quilt in a Day book.  It was the same book she followed in making the quilt above for us.

Her gift opened a door for me that I've never cared to close.  It ignited this inspiration and passion that is still going strong ten years later.

Thank you, Emily! 

Counting up

Last Saturday when I got this site up and running, I had the chance to look through my long-neglected picture files on my laptop.  I was inspired to do a little spring cleaning through many years of digital picture files and folders dating back to my earliest digital images from 2002 when I spent WAYYY too much money on a 1.6 megapixel Canon camera. 

Over the last few days, I separated the pictures into family/personal photos, quilting photos of my personal patchwork, and then longarming business photos.  

Oh Jess, you're so adorable!

I've had a sewing machine for the last 10 years exactly.  As I remembered it, I started a quilt immediately after getting the machine, but photos actually reminded me that I first made a curtain for my new baby's nursery and didn't start quilting until a few months later.  So, as I approach my 10 year anniversary of quilting, I'm feeling this need to look back and take stock of the quilts I've made.  I do want to know a number, yes - but I also am wanting to be reminded of how that quilt-making tracked alongside my life.

In some years, there are very few photos of a very few projects.  In other years, the folders are bustling with hundreds of photos of various stages of quilt-making with all sorts of colors, sizes, techniques and people in mind as recipients. 

As I look forward to many more years of quilting, I'm also taking the time to look back and remember what came before.