Bound and Determined

I'm by no means a prolific quilt maker, a prolific quilter of other peoples quilts yes, but maker of my own...no. I am hoping that will change and I have taken some pretty good steps in that direction this year so far. I took three quilts to my very good friend Irene who does the majority of my binding for me. While I actually love doing binding, so does Irene and it gives me a good excuse to see her and sew pillowcases which apparently one household can never have enough of. I also can think of few things that I enjoy more than sewing and staring out onto this beautiful city I am lucky enough to call home.

In an incredibly short time frame my quilts are returned to me perfectly bound. And her only request is that I bring her more and soon.

I finally finished my value quilt! This was an exciting finish for me because it is the first quilt that I have made that actually fits the bed. What a novel idea, a quilt that fits a bed, who knew such a thing could be so useful? Every quilt I have made up to this point just barely covers the mattress....duh.

It is gigantic though and weighs roughly eighty thousand pounds. I had to enlist three friends to hold it up for me after we almost lost it over board the Vashon ferry.

For Katie's value quilt tutorial link here

This quilt is full of so many of my most treasured fabrics and backed with a very snuggly flannel and an even softer mini corduroy. I have been on a healing health journey and have been realizing the importance of sleep. 

I can't help but wonder if I may have taken this concept too far?

 Will I ever leave my bed again? 

When is cozy bad?

 Is too much sleep dangerous?

Can I cook from my bed? 

Should I move the kitchen to the bedroom?

I will get back to you with the answer to these pressing enquiries.

Another finish was my x-plus quilt that I started a very long time ago and finished piecing at my annual Loon Lake retreat. It was smaller than I had originally intended but it needed to be finished. Now it will fit in nicely with every other undersized quilt (besides giganto up there) I have ever made that serves very little practical purpose and barely covers a human.

I quilted an inch grid allover design on it, not the easiest quilting job but I am in love with the overall effect.

The final quilt that was bound for me was my newest sample quilt that I am in love with. It is my wholecloth sampler that I blogged about here. 

Speaking of whole cloth quilts, I took a whole cloth design class many years ago from Karen McTavish with my dear friend Barbara Magill. We took the class in Kansas at the Machine quilting show MQS. It was one of the first big shows I had ever attended and was so much fun in so many ways. Barbara and I took our hotel room apart moving tables and rearranging our beds and every thing else that weighed more than the two of us combined to accommodate our need to finish designing our work. We also collectively purchased more stencils than we could haul back to Seattle with us and I had weird bruises on my thighs from scaling a fence for Barbara's supply list that went flying out of her grasp in what seemed to me like a small tornado. In our beds that night we noticed that the blankets were heavy like lead X-Ray blankets and I almost wet my bed laughing when Barbara shouted out that the blanket just grabbed her ass. 

Barbara died last Thursday, she has fought cancer for as long as I have known her. We always joked,"what happens in Kansas stays in Kansas" it was one of the last things we said to each other. I am sharing a little bit of what happened in Kansas because it makes me too sad not to. Barbara never quilted her whole cloth, in the next few weeks I will be going through her things and I will find it and finish it, for her, for me, for us.

I am really going to miss her. Hug your quilting friends, cherish them, love them, laugh with them, remember them.