|
|
Thoughts along the way
GIVING
Give with love, from the heart. The lucky loved ones that receive your gift will be surrounded by your love for the rest of their life.
Times and people change, but the truth of that moment will forever be how you feel when you make a gift of love.
We were all young once and all the crayons in the box were wonderful to contemplate when creating our artwork. Let your inner child help you make the choice of colors and patterns to use in making a quilt.
Common sense should have a place at our side as we begin a gift quilt:
1. Babies are messy little units - their quilts should be sewn by machine and considered disposable, with a shelf life of 6 - 8 years. They will long remember that raggedy quilt with the red sailboats that gramma made and they drug around the house until it was too tired and they were too old to be seen with a blankie. Kept in a closet “for good”, quilt and child grow old with no fond memories of what it was meant for, or all the love it had to share.
If you insist on hand quilting an “heirloom” for the new member of the family, include and attractive hanger with the gift quilt, so it can hang in view as they grow.
2. Color coded nurseries that are decorated “just so” only exist in glossy magazines and nervous mother’s imaginations. Do babies really care what color their bedroom is??? If it is THAT BIG of an issue, you can bet YOUR LAST FAT QUARTER that it will be a different color in two years; so go ahead and make that red, yellow and blue circus quilt for the new baby girl, she will love it for what it is and her nervous mother can take pills for her problem.
RECEIVING
You have been chosen - CHOSEN - to be gifted with a quilt.
The very most important part of this is to acknowledge the fact that you were chosen. Recognize that fact and the actions of the giver. Be GRATEFUL for the thought; the love and caring, the sharing of oneself. The actual quilt, large or small, grand or plain, is a secondary gift. The act of giving is the treasure you are receiving. Embrace the soul of the experience; quilt, quiltmaker and all; it is an experience to treasure, to take with you on your travels down life’s roads. The gift will give you strength.
Any critical thoughts you harbor regarding the color, size, pattern or workmanship will only serve the purpose of darkening your world.
As you say Thank You - I Love It, you will feel the quilt working its magic in your soul.
|
| I Can Do This |
| |
Thirty years ago, a woman told me "You can do it".
She knew.
I doubted; the process, the possibities and most of all, my abilities.
She persisted, "You can do it".
I persisted, honored by her trust and knowledge.
She knew, now I know, "I can do this".
Technique and design fade into unimportance in the face of truth.
I Can Do This |
|
| Let Them Speak! |
| |
Every beginning has a story. Quilts spring to life for as many different reasons as there are quiltmakers. Fabric and pattern selections the DNA for each quilt.
Many members of the quilting family tree live out private lives, warming bodies and souls of loved ones, wearing out with daily duty. The quiltmaker added love to fabric and pattern; that love is the ingredient that ties the human layers together throughout the course of time.
Some of our quilts are honored to be shared with others at quilt shows around the country. They revel in the moment and share their beauty with joy. Like our quilts on display, we quilters hold our heads high, proud of the collective gathering of so many different origins and inspirations. Like the quilts, we are joined by threads of cotton, creativity and color.
Through creativity and sharing we seek and find Acceptance, Appreciation and Affirmation. |
|
| Making a Quilt |
| |
 Forget perfect...........do your best and be happy with your efforts.
The quilt you create, flaws real or imagined is infinitely more satisfying than not making a quilt at all because fear won’t allow you to make “anything less than perfect”.
You wouldn’t let anyone else hold you to that standard, would you?
Pursuing a creative endeavor can be fulfilling in many aspects of your life:
the joy of creativity, the courage of learning new skills and letting your imagination turn an idea into a tangible REAL thing: out of your head and onto the bed! The point of pursuing a creative undertaking is to ENJOY the process, as well as the product. We learn by doing things - we do it wrong, then get it right in order to learn. A mistake is a learning opportunity: you must try in order to succeed.
As a child, when you were ready to walk, did you:
A. Stand up and take one step, sit down and quit?
B. Strap on roller skates and head for the nearest steep hill?
C. Take some steps, fall, get up and take some more steps?
Why as adults, do we treat new leaning experiences as trials of survival? Where is our sense of doing things for the fun of it? I sense that spirit is alive and well in many of you; growing and spreading like a virus. No vaccinations are needed, but a few pinpricks are to be expected. |
|
|
