A long, long time ago...

...on a quilting table not to far away, I made a quilt for my boyfriend. In this particular situation allow me to define "long, long time ago" as about seven months. 


I don't remember why I wanted to start quilting, but boy, I'm glad I did. And right around that time I thought I would be nice to make something for the wonderful guy that I've been with for four years. I guess, then, it should be said in all honesty that the first two quilts I made were sort of "warm ups". I wanted to make something that had movement. That was warm and comfortable yet durable enough to take out for an afternoon picnic out by the blackberry bushes in his back yard. So based on something he had said to me at one point I made my own design and jumped head first into the world of make-it-up-as-you-go. I call it Heebz Theory. I've done well by it almost my whole life and I didn't see why it would fail me now. 

I seem to remember making a test square to make sure that he wouldn't hate the idea. After all, the colors didn't match anything in his room, or furnishings, or stuff in general. always good to muck up some fat quarters to come up with a concept.  Luckily, he liked it and he gave me the green light to plunge into the project. 

The Great and Powerful Mack: He swears he's helping!

With all new projects you have that running start with all the excitement and anticipation. I had just come off of completing my first two quilts after all and did them both in a weekend each! This will be a breeze. How very wrong I was. I was dealing with new concepts here that I hadn't even comprehended at the time. On top of all that - guess who still hadn't bothered to learn or teach herself how to cut accurately? Oh yea. In a pattern that called for quite a few 90 degree angles it was an adventure realizing fundamental and elementary concepts such as "rulers move as soon as you touch them". But I cut along on my merry way and did my own thing using the Heebz Theory. 


"Winter changed into spring, spring changed into summer, summer changed back into winter, and winter gave spring and summer a miss and went straight on into autumn..." such is the weather in New England. 

You'll notice the kitty bed in the lower left side: The Great and Powerful Mack prefers the comfort of the projects of his subjects rather than provided fleecy comfort. 

I did have to take a break for a bit on this one because my grandfather came around as spring started to wake up in my neck of the woods and all sewing projects were put on hold during his stay. I tend to make a fair bit of mess while working and such things cannot be seen. :-p It was good to take a break because there did come a time when I wanted to run screaming from the house. Quite a lot of effort was going into this quilt and as the weeks went by I learned more and got better with each star completed.

 I quickly realized that this is a a craft of precision. For those of you who know me very well, precision is not something that goes along with my personal idom. For Christ's sake, I don't even have numbers on my watch! Needless to say, the 'p-word', took some getting used to. But as I learned, and cut, and practiced and toiled over every single thing I remembered that somethings will be looked at under a magnified glass: cell structure, the health care plan, immigration reform, the dishes. This however, was not.  The rule taught to me by my friend Lola was the general rule of crafting costumes for theater. "If they can't see it from 12 feet away...who cares! Only you will know." And as this piece will only be judged by me and loved by another I decided it was okay to relax and say "it's okay, the sashing will save you". 

It took several months and much toil but I'm certain that I wouldn't have wanted to learn how to quilt any other way. And for all intensive purposes, it came out the way I wanted it. It's warm, fluffy, and the pattern has some twinkle like movement to it. I am pleased. 

And Tim is too. :)

Thank you, my love, for being my guinea pig. The next one will be for all the tomorrows.