Carried Away

So I'm getting carried away with blogging... It's a bit like how I started quilting. Soon after starting to quilt I was introduced to Amy and Maria two fabulous domestic divas, writers, bloggers (It's Whatever - The Leaf Chronicle), and quilters/seamstresses.

So how did I get carried away with quilting, you wonder?

It all started with going to my first American Quilting Society, Quilt Show in Paducah KY.
Amy, Maria and I started the morning with coffee of course and headed off for my first quilt show. We stopped at Hancock's of Paducah, the largest fabric store I had ever seen. While standing over a bin of cut scraps I asked for help from Maria on colors because she is an awesome graphic designer and fabulous with choosing colors. An older quilter asked me something like why I needed help and I said because I'm a new quilter... she called over to her other friend and said, "Hey Mary (I'm paraphrasing) she's a new quilter". I was so excited to be part of the crowd, and felt so accepted....

The quilt show was huge and amazing and I came home with sooo much stuff! Here's a picture of my stash.

Here is what I've made so far with the items above. It's a wall hanging made with a picture of my wonderful husband while he was deployed in Iraq. I made this wall hanging and the photo included using Printed Treasures - Printing Fabric. ...

For those that are looking at the picture and only see a few items used ---this is the beauty of quilting... your stash just grows and grows....

9 Patch Pizazz - In design phase. This quilt was for my brother-in-law who loves to play chess and it inspired the choice of the pattern. For a new quilter you can see how the quilt looks completely different when you choose to move your blocks around.

The Basics

So for those that are not quilters, yet, let me briefly describe the process...





The first three steps can happen in any order.
1) Decide to start a project (You may be inspired while shopping)
2) Choose fabric (This can involve shopping for fabric)
3) Choose a pattern (This can invovle shopping)

4) Prepare fabric for piecing (this usually includes ironing --oh whoops I mean "pressing")
5) Piece fabric together through the following process:
cut, sew, cut, sew, press, cut, sew, cut, sew, press, press press...
6) Complete the top of the quilt (this may include piecing a border)
7) Choose a back for the quilt and batting (the middle of the quilt)
8) Press the top and back again.
8) Baste (put) your quilt sandwich together. (top, batting, back)
9) Choose a quillt pattern and quilt
10) Choose binding, piece binding and bind quilt.

10 Easy steps... HA!!

I have projects in probably everyone of these stages/steps. Mostly its the "choosing" that keeps me from moving forward, you see the creative part of quilting is the more difficult part.

So after that first quilt I convinced my sister and mom to each do a yellow brick road, one with "nature like" batiks and one with a red and white pattern. My sister a frequent traveler decided to piece by hand. My mom took a different route, she decided that quilting by paper instructions and phone explanations was too difficult and sent the cut fabric pieces to my grandmother, a wonderful seamstress, to piece together. I eventually finished the border, had it quilted by Linda Bridges, and sent it for binding to the last sister in the family to finish a Payne (my maiden name) family quilt. Quilts of the same pattern but different fabric or quilts of the same pattern and fabrics with different quilting patterns can look completely different. In an effort to explain this to the newer quilters, I am including a picture of the yellow brick road pattern quilt with nature inspired batiks.

peaceful quilting - Michelle

The Beginning

I've been quilting 2 or 3 years now. As I start this blog I think back to how it started. It was actually my friend Jessy who said we should take a quilting class. The class was taught by Janie Rupe at the Meandering Stitch (no longer open) in Clarksville, TN. It was the everything a quilt store should be (fabulous fabric, coffee, and a friendly staff). We came in the morning of, bought our rulers, pattern (Yellow Brick Road by Atkinson Designs), got help picking our colors through fat quarters (the hardest part) and settled in behind our sewing machines.

Then we learned first you iron. I have to tell you I wasn't thrilled with the idea of so much ironing to quilt. I loved the math part of the quilting process. It's not hard math and it's not intensive; but, for an analytical person like myself I think that piecing with all of the measuring and cutting of the fabric is probably my favoire part of the process (well except maybe the shopping part).

So that first day I picked my fabrics, ironed them, cut them as neded, and started piecing them together. The following weekends I visited the quilt shop a lot. I met Pam, Linda, and many others those first few weeks. I learned a lot about sewing, quilting, fabrics, color theory etc...

That first quilt started me down a road I never thought I'd take. Quilts to me seemed difficult, "BIG", complicated, old. I've now involved 2 sisters, a grandmother, and my mom in quilting. they haven't fallen head over heels for quilting yet; but, we've completed numerous quilts together across the continent (Thank you USPS).

So that first quilt was a lap sized, yellow brick road, based on a Windham Colonial replica fabric (if I remember correctly) and I added some modern patterns in with it. I'm attaching a picture of just the top.

peaceful quilting - Michelle