A Simple Introduction…

SPREADING BEAUTY, JOY AND MAKING DREAMS COME TRUE!

Welcome! Welcome! Welcome!  I feel that I have a story to tell before all else.  Let me first ask, how many of you are new to quilting?  Not only is the best of quilting in longevity, but in all of the newbies.  After listening to people, talking with fellow quilters, and reading of others self-starts, I realized that we all have a story of how quilting began to take hold on our lives.  Personally, I am always intrigued with each and every of them.  I find it most interesting how different those stories are, but we all still share the same passion.  A passion that is unlike any other,  but that passion is so similar to each other.  And how we get there has so many difference.  Like every quilt has a story, so does each quilter.

My own story isn’t that touching, but it is my story, none the less.  I didn’t grow up with a quilter in my family.  Even if there was, I grew up as an only child in a military family that traveled all over the world, and my mother or father did not quilt while I was younger.  My mother, though, is very creative and was always doing different types of crafts that she would try to humor me with.  Some of the crafts that I can remember were:  macramé plant holders (if we were around in the 70s, I feel we all experienced that), ceramics, sewing and making Halloween costumes, crocheting, and painting.  Man, can my mother paint a beautiful picture!!  I did not get the gene to be the next Leonardo da Vinci, by any stretch of the imagination.  I cannot even draw a good stick figure.  But, I did take on the art of crocheting.  It wasn’t until sometime in my 30s.  But during that time, my extended family (meaning outside my kids and husband) became more important to me.  Every year, my mother’s side of the family hosts a family reunion.  At this event, my grandmother has a crocheted afghan to auction off to help supply funds for the next year’s reunion.  WE ALL WANT ONE!  She has more than 20 for years to come after she joins her husband in heaven.   As both my grandmother and my mother are avid crocheters, I decided to teach myself the art.  I dove right in and made several afghans of different sizes, a few hats, and even a few Christmas ornaments.  However, I got bored with it very quickly.  

At some point, during this time, my mother decided to take on the art of quilting.  Being a child of a very large family (11 siblings where she is the 2nd oldest and the oldest girl), she had been taught to hand and machine sew.  She has memories of various females in her family making quilts, to include her mother, while she was a child.  Like everything else my mother does, her quilts are beautiful.  She bought me my first sewing machine, but I still didn’t have the bug at that time (like I said, she is always trying to humor me in new crafts).  I had no idea how to even use a sewing machine, not even how to thread it.  So, there it sat for a few years or more, until I got bored with crocheting.  Looking at the beautiful art work she created with those quilts, I got inspired.  She invited me to a quilting Expo, where I saw even more beautiful art and understood that each quilt had its own story.  Sink and hook!!!!  I ended up buying a book with a pattern in it that I was going to attempt my first quilt with. 

Not very long after the show, my husband went with me to purchase fabric from a quilt shop for my first masterpiece.  He too is very creative and has an eye for color.   I had no idea about flying geese, 4 patches, 9 patches, HST, different needle sizes, or even anything about thread.  But, I was on a mission to make this quilt.  My husband also purchased a self-healing cutting mat, rotary blade, and a couple of rulers.  I used the needle that was in my machine and purchased some “machine quilting” thread.  I was set!  For as little as I knew, I was well on my way to complete the mission and was extremely excited.

I read the machine’s manual to learn how to spool a bobbin, thread the machine, use it, and even for trouble shooting.  I watched countless videos online to learn how to cut my fabric and sew different blocks and types of quilts.  After I got all the fabric cut, I pieced every day for hours and hours.  Finally, I finished the quilt!   

Ta Da!!! Now what??? LOL I had to figure out how to quilt it.

Needless to say, I again did my research and decided to hand quilt it.  I am still working on that today.  However, I have since pieced other quilts and have learned to FMQ on a domestic.  As they say, the rest is history!

I have since bought a long arm, follow other quilters, engage in hearing others’ stories, opened a business, and here I am blogging (Never saw that one coming)!

Now that I have shared my story, I am hoping to hear some of yours!  I have also learned that quilters are and quilting is a very social culture.  We learn from each other, share things with each other, and support each other, just to name a few.  That is part of the history of quilting, and still holds true today.

Again, looking forward to hearing your stories!  Until next time, may you continued to be inspired, productive, and joyful!  And never stop making your dreams in quilting come true!