I was in a QUILT SHOW!!

Even though I've been a quilter for about 20 years, I have never had a quilt of mine in a quilt show.  Well, I guess there was this one time at the fair when I was a teenager, but it was SUPER STRESSFUL!  I mean, the JUDGEMENT!  Ugh!  I have a large enough anxiety issue without all of that pressure and judgey-ness on my hobby, for heavens sake.  So, over the years, I've decided that my quilts will remain in my house, and only shared with people who, if they have a judgement or criticism, will have the good sense to keep it to themselves so I don't have to throat-punch them.

But then, my friends in the Rubystreet Art Quilters group had a show at a local library recently, and there was no judgement to get into the show, there were no prizes, no juries, no stress of any kind really.  So, not one but TWO of my quilts hung in that!  And, it was amazing; I was very proud of myself, and I didn't have a panic attack over it.  Success and growth right there, people, that's what that is!

Here they are, hanging in the library's rafters:

This quilt is one that I've posted on here before, I think.  I started it a long time ago, and recently got it quilted.  It's from the book Material Obsession by Kathy Doughty and Sarah Filke.  Their version had brown backgrounds behind the flowers, but I was really into white at the time, so that's what I used in my version.



This quilt was totally inspired by the book Sunday Morning Quilts by Amanda Jean Nyberg & Cheryl Arkinson.  I absolutely LOVE LOVE LOVE this book, and I've made several projects from it.  I thoroughly enjoy their scrap quilting method called "Slabs" and I used that idea when I made this quilt.  It's called "Blackout", and was a Christmas gift for my husband.  He is a gun collector, and has one called a Blackout 300, which as far as I'm concerned, is Greek for "expensive."  But as he was explaining to me what makes it a Blackout and a 300, and I was trying to listen, I had this quilt idea flash before my eyes, so I got to work.  The cross in it is supposed to look like when you look through a gun's sights, but as I am a Girl, I wasn't really certain what that looked like, so I made up my own interpretation.

Here it is up a little closer so it's easier to see all the separate pieces in the "Slabs."  One thing I did NOT think about with this quilt is that we have a white cat.  White cat + all black quilt = a big ole non-practical mess...

So, there are my OFFICIAL show quilts!  Ha, I was in a show!  A couple more non-judgmental things like this, and I may get up the courage to enter a real, juried quilt show...who knows?!?  Of course, I may need to up my meds before that happens...

Low-volume quilt

So for 20 years or so, I've been a pretty excellent quilt TOP maker, but I've kinda been behind in the actual QUILTING part of things.  So about 2 years ago, I bought myself a machine JUST for quilting, and I've been having a really good time!  Except for the fact that things keep popping of the machine and hitting me in the forehead, which is problematic.  But, don't worry -- I always wear glasses, so they'll act as protective eye gear if I need it.  Who knew quilting could be so hazardous?

Anyway, I have my poor, friendly sewing machine repairman stumped, because apparently he's never seen this issue in any machine but mine.  So pretty much its the lottery you DON'T want to win.  The fact that it's happened twice now definitely indicates operator error in my opinion, but F.S.M. Repairman has been too kind to say this kind of thing out loud, or even agree with me when I suggested it as an option.  I should probably thank him for that...

But this means that the stack of pinned quilts are still not quilted, because my quilting machine is in the shop again.  So, I've dug out my back-up piecing machine (the one with the REALLY GOOD 1/4" foot), and I'm cutting and sewing up fabric and projects for quilt tops that have been on hold.  For example:

Years ago, while working in a quilt shop, I ended up with a sample pack from a fabric rep of these woven baby plaids.  There wasn't a huge amount of any of them, and they were all weird sizes, so I squared them up, added a white square, sewed corner to corner, and turned them into half square triangles....

I found some polka dots on a white background, and a seersucker plaid with all the same colors, so I made some of those blocks as unifying triangles.   Then, I mapped them out with my trusty graph paper, so they would be evenly distributed over the whole quilt top.

I have them all pinned and ready to sew up into rows.  I'm thinking I'll add a white border, I have a flannel from my stash for the back, and I have enough of the dots for binding...Then to quilt it up, and I can send it to my friend who has a new baby!

I really didn't have a pattern for this one.  So, I was afraid at first that this would be a somewhat boring layout, but I'm really liking it so far.  It's such a nice low-volume quilt.  


Hopefully, my quilting machine will be well soon, and home from Sewing Machine Hospital, and I can get back to all those pinned quilt tops...especially since I'm making more! :)