Has anyone ever, in the process of squaring up the edges of a quilt that has been expertly quilted, misaligned their ruler so that there were four inches of border on one side and only three on the other and made a cut before realizing it?
OH YES I DID! My daughter heard my moans of anquish from across the room (where she was pressing blocks for another top) and came over and looked. She said, "Oh my." I just groaned incoherantly on the floor.
So, now I am faced with either a) making the border narrower OR b) zigzagging an inch or so into the quilt to secure the damage. I am leaning toward the latter as I think I love my border more than some delusion that future generations will consider me an expert quilter.
(The quilting itself was done by Deborah Norris - didn't she do a fabulous job? She accentuated the blossoms shapes and did freehand flowers and vines on the background.)
I will zigzag in yellow to match the border and it will be okay. This is what I am telling myself. This is actually the first quilt to be finished from the pattern line I'm debuting at Market, so I think it is fitting that it be marked insome special way - and I have certainly found a method to put my unique stamp on it.
(If you are at Market, please stop by booth 2224 to meet the unfortunate victim of my rotary cutter - and to meet the antagonist in this saga.)
On another note, lots of quilters devote time to teaching young people how to sew and I think that is great. (Julie, of
Jaybird Quilts, recently blogged about helping a girl scout troop with a project and Allison, of
Cluck Cluck Sew, wrote about a great project involving fabric and lots of glue that she did with her young son.) Although it does certainly take more time to produce quilts with young children "helping" (I have secretly unstitched many a seam to make blocks fit together) I can vouch for the fact that, in the end, giving new, enthusastic sewers confidence in their growing skills certainly pays off. I am currently reaping the benefits of having an expert 12 year old sewer in the house. (She is my preferred helper in everything sewing-related - and is much better at it than most adults.) When she was six or seven she helped by running zigzag stitches around blocks that I was going to applique. (My ten year old son, incidentally, is an expert in ripping stabilizer off of the backs of quilts - there is something for everyone, even the destruction-proned. Yes, he obviously gets that from me.) So if you have a son, daughter, niece or nephew in your life, find a project that they can do an help them discover the joy of working with their hands in this digital age. And if anyone out there has some fantastic ideas about projects that are suitable and enjoyable for young sewers, please share. I'd love to hear what everyone is doing!
Now it is time to have my daughter help me with that zigzag stitch. Happy sewing!
Amanda
Labels: quilting, quilts, Veranda
