Quilts to Quilt

I’ve been sewing forever. I’m saying self-taught. Although when I was in third grade I belonged to a 4-H sewing club. I made a poncho. It had bucking horses on it.

And then there was the 12-week required Home Ec course in 7th and 8th grade. I was a total failure. I had to model my jumper by holding up the pieces.

But at some point I taught myself to make my own clothes. And I was pretty good at it although I don’t make clothes very often anymore. More about that in a later post. But I like to make “things”. Drapes, pillows, slip covers, tea towels, roman shades, totes.

Quilting is my latest sewing obsession. I have a quilt in the works, another sitting patiently on the sidelines waiting to be cut out, a third designed in my little graph notebook, the fourth (and perhaps the fifth) tucked inside my head waiting to be sketched out.

The first quilt I made was way back when daughter Jes was probably about 6-months old. That was about 37 years ago. Just a bunch of squares of bright fabrics stitched together with an old blanket for batting and a blanket stitch around the outer edges. Hand embroidered around all the squares with a chain stitch. Really wish I had a photo of that first project. But I can see it clearly in my mind. Along with sweet Jessica’s little smile and wee hands grabbing for the colors.

I’ve come a long way since then!

I had a false start about 10 years ago when I made my second quilt using the Better Homes and Gardens booklet “Weekend Quilts”.

Took me a LOT longer than a weekend to finish that project. It went into storage a few times. Doing all that stitching was excruciating. And it wasn’t big enough to actually use for anything.

Although I have to admit when I found this quilt the other day and checked it out, I did a pretty good job!

But I’ve always loved quilts and knew I would eventually start making them so last year when my new little grand niece was due to arrive I whipped up this adorable little lovey for sweet little Willow

I followed this one with a sailor quilt for new great-nephew Tyson in June.

Then I wanted to make a queen-size applique quilt for granddaughter Piper. I started with a small size to see if I could do it.

And put together the queen-sized version and all went well until I tried to quilt it.

I wanted to quilt inside of and outside of each heart in the center. That was almost impossible with my little Bernina. I ended up hand quilting the center. And decided all my quilts in the future would be twin, nap, or baby sized. Unless I got a new machine. One with a deep throat to quilt. And it might as well embroider, too. Dream on.