17 in 2017 and Other Misc. Stuff That I like to Chatter About

Don't forget to check in with my Quilty 365 Linkup and Giveaway. Lots of great variations and creativity on display! Also, I have EQ7 software for Windows that I've decided to sell. Shoot me an email if you're interested and we can discuss the details! So... there's been a little progress on Meredithe's 17ufosin2017 challenge. I'm lagging a bit behind for linking up, but wanted to record my forward motion.

Another border for Folksy Flowers

Folksy Flowers {above} has the next border all planned and prepped. What you're looking at will have to be appliqued as I don't like to sew fiddly little blocks together. Much easier to hand stitch! It looks so simple, but actually represents at least an hour or two of contemplation and fabric play to come to a final decision.

All of my alternate Rising Sun blocks are now appliqued and ready for the next phase. There are 12 in all as I quickly determined that the 9 initial blocks were not enough. Sometimes I have to laugh as my quilts always seem to grow and expand at rapid rates, quite beyond my control it seems! Bed size {or close to those measurements} just make me happier than most little lap quilts that won't even properly cover our toes.*wink

Looking at the alternate blocks for Rising Sun quilt

And yes, you've seen this border work already for the Improv. Woven Basket quilt. I haven't progressed much past this yet, but honestly, this is the project that I'm dying to work on. Every single time I get to work on these leaves, it just makes me smile. But... there are other things in the queue and these borders are {so far} working as a great carrot and stick approach!

The border work for Improv. Woven Basket quilt

Then, there's a totally completed, get-to-cross-it-off-the-list quilt finish! Woohoo! My Big Broken Dish quilt, otherwise known as 'The Creative Process' is DONE. After a conversation with my husband, I ended up gifting it to a longtime friend. It just seemed like a good fit. Hard to ignore those urgings!

So, at the beginning of May, I have managed to cross 7 out of 17 items off my list. Not all were actual completions, but the ones that weren't, were brought to the 'quilt top' stage which was the goal for about half of my projects on the list. Real progress. And what's funny is that it's not a whole lot different that what I've been doing for the last couple years. The thing is, I'm a lot more aware of the projects that seem to be languishing. Ahem. Could it be because I'm going to totally ditch them in the near future? lol  So very tempting!

The Creative Process quilt is finished!

And in other news, the city museum peoples approached me about putting my Fire Quilt in the museum for an extended period of time. There had been talk last year, but this time they wanted it asap as the 'firestorm' exhibit was finally coming together and there was a tour planned for the County Historical Society. The museum {which is in the converted old firehouse} only had a small room for the new exhibit and the quilt rods available were too short. Thinking outside the box, my husband and one of the museum volunteers suggested hanging a new rod directly onto the wall in the meeting area, immediately to the right of the exhibit. It ended up being a wonderful place to showcase the quilt as people come around the corner before they 'see' it and so the impact is magnified. Plus it brightens up that drab corner considerably!

I had lots of pains of anxiety, but weathered through it while frantically trying to find a good hanging sleeve tutorial. Both of these tutorials were of great help to me and to my relief, the quilt hung very well from the pole--no pooching out at the rod or having the quilt sleeve poke up over the top sort of issues!*sigh   {A big thanks to my husband for reminding me make two sleeves with a gap in the middle for the bracket hardware!} One long sleeve would have been such a disaster! Oh, and they wanted me to type up a legend for the quilt. Yeah. Uh huh. It ended up being a two page, abbreviated story instead and I was a wilted, wet tissue afterwords.

Things Will Never Be The Same on display at the local museum now!

But it's done now. Another chapter in the life of my crazy story quilt! I heard it was very well received by the Historical Society so that's something. It's just all so interesting as I really am generally very low key about my quilting adventures to the people I live around {immediate family and Internet blog posts aside}!

Things Will Never Be the Same--Fall 2016 Bloggers Quilt Festival

It's time for that wonderful on-line Bloggers Quilt Festival once again! Amy does a great job putting this together and I'd like to thank her for her efforts! The quilt was one that I questioned very seriously whether it should be included. But then, I thought, if even one person gets inspired by this quilt to make their own story quilt, then it will all be totally worthwhile.

The story of a fire in our town

These kinds of story quilts are quite grueling actually. I don't think I realized the depth of emotion required to get to a finish, until last year when I finally took the last stitch and just sort of sagged back into my chair. My story is similar to lots of other people's across the USA {and Australia} in the last several years, only we didn't actually lose our house. Almost! But to some people that doesn't matter because 'almost' can't possibly be traumatic. lol  Yeah. Still laughing. But at least it was nature, not people causing the damage like in the case of the current rioting issues across the nation. I think that would be harder to process, don't you?

Trying to figure things out

There's always so much mental conflict, emotion and horror at dealing with these destructive acts of nature. Feeling completely out of control and wanting to place a little blame, figure out what went wrong and what we might do differently the next time. Feeling so fragile in the face the aftermath--what our family and friends are having to deal with. Trying to give real, true help and not just throw a little pity their way and then forget about their pain. Planning and working through the implementation of this quilt really helped me put all those feelings where they belonged and worked as a sort of therapy. Oh how I loved and hated this quilt!

Lots of crazy emotions

So much harder than I thought it would be, but I felt so driven to tell the story. Because it matters! And if you're a quilter, how else to tell the story but with fabric and thread? Stitch after stitch, I could feel the emotion being embedded into the fiber, almost beyond my control! Little details being added in constantly to add more emphasis--such as the little red and white dotty circles representing the embers flying through our town, setting one thing after another on fire. The flag that flew upside down in our town for months, signally our great distress to outsiders. The way I tried to write 'Pateros' to emulate our town sign that eerily burned {completely into two and then incinerated} and  now can never be replaced because of new zoning laws.

The pain of determining the value of our belongings

I posted a bit about the process on my blog here and there, but always felt so inadequate. Which then got a lot worse when I entered the quilt into our local quilt show {on the 1 yr. anniversary of our town burning} only to be basically shunned. {Yeah, it's true 'cuz this year I didn't even get my usual email to enter quilts!} My emotions were ALL OVER THE PLACE after that, but as my mom says, it got my 'mad up' and gave me the motivation to enter the quilt into a larger venue.

It really happened just like that

So terrifying, but at least it proved to me that I wasn't a complete and total whacko. Genuine shock and awe followed when I got the first glimpse of my quilt hanging in that much larger show. A Best of Show ribbon!! and whenever I made my way back over to look at my quilt, people standing in front of it for a very long time. This happened at the one other show I entered this quilt into as well. People standing, reading through the quilt, taking pictures, talking and crying with their friends as they took the time to process the message. So gratifying that the message was able to resonate with strangers. So humbling.

Things Will Never Be the Same

I don't care if this quilt gets voted on or not in this festival. It just seemed like a good place to enter it and say I'm so grateful to be a quilter in times like these. Whether or not I have another story quilt in me remains to be seen. This one still gets my nerves humming along just by reading through the words and remembering that day. That summer. And yes people in our community have moved on, recovered and/or rebuilt. Their lives have definitely improved, most of them. But not all. Some will always view that summer as the moment when their lives took a turn for the worse. That seems to be the capriciousness of life the world over.

Anyway, thanks for reading through if you did. My loyal readers have already heard the whole story over and over and over and over.*wink  I'm entering this quilt into the Applique category if you'd like to go have a look there as well!

A Little Spark of Inspiration

10/23/15 Update: My quilt came home with this third place ribbon. So exciting!!

Third Place in the Modern Category

I know you're all getting tired of this quilt, but today was pretty incredible. My mom, a good friend and I traveled over to the Washington State Quilters 37th Annual Quilt Show in Spokane, Washington where I got to see one of my quilts hanging. Along with hundreds of other really great and wonderful quilts.

In another quilt show

I'm still blown away. The very first time I went to this particular quilt show I went around and mentally said 'I can never make anything this good. I will never have the skills to sew something like this.' And on and on and on, as you can only imagine a beginning quilter feeling the delight of seeing so many beautiful quilts mixed with despair at how very much there was to learn.

Seeing it through my eyes today....

And today I got to see one of my quilts hanging in that same space. {Okay. You got the message.} It was so much fun to see people standing in front of my quilt, silently reading, sometimes chatting, little kids taking pics with their cell phones. Just taking it in. Or not. I saw people glance at it and walk right on by too.

The spark that started this quilt on it's long, often difficult journey

My friend asked me how I got the courage to put a quilt into this particular show. Hmm... That's a long story. More important is how I got the mental fortitude to make this particular quilt. Well, that's because I really, really didn't know what I was setting myself up for. Or how long it would take and that the idea was too compelling to ever totally quit so I didn't really have a choice anyway?

We never really know what playtime can yield...

Funny how ideas can explode into something larger than our imagination. Did you get to go to the show too? Amazing where life can take us. Thank you Spokane for letting me have a small bit of space in your show! Vive La Difference!

Linking up with Quilty Inspiration #4.

Sometimes It Works Out Better

Well, the NCW 2015 Quilt Show was this weekend. I took my quilts down to Wenatchee on Monday for drop-off {it's an hour drive}. Practically shaking when I handed them over, I managed to leave them instead of gathering them all up and making a mad dash for the door. It felt a little like dropping a child off for the first day of Kindergarten.

X's and O's

I took all my pics with the flash off which makes the lighting seem not as good as it actually was. My X's and O's quilt had a really lovely glow about it {which I always knew it had} and made me feel very proud. Spring Forward looked soft and approachable {another proud moment}. I so loved being able to see them both hanging tall and proud--happiness in good lighting. It's always such a thrill to see our quilts hanging up for once instead of being wadded up in a ball at the end of the couch.*wink

Spring Forward

Forgive me for not remembering to get the full names of all who made the following quilts. Photo taking is not something that comes naturally to me and I often forget why I even have the thing dangling off my wrist. The quilt below was a wonderful example of wool up-cycling. I felt positively inspired to start combing my local 2nd hand stores for possible quilty uses.

A beautiful up-cycled quilt

The vintage/antique looking quilts caught my eye as usual. I'm beginning to think a hexy quilt might very well be in my far off, distant future...

Lovely hexies

The Dresden quilt below was quite possibly the most inspiring quilt in the whole show to me! The coloring is very bad in this picture, but if you could just imagine the various prints in this quilt looking spunky? Paired with the crhome yellow, lets just say that I was completely enamored of this quilt.

A gorgeous Dresden quilt

I had to smile at the quilt below. It gave off a very fun vintage vibes that I well appreciate.

A bit of a vintage vibe

I really enjoyed looking at this applique quilt although I'm quite positive yours truly would never be able to make something turn out quite this polished looking. And another great border idea!

Interesting applique border

Had to smile at this little quilt in one of the vender booths. Shades of my Sunburst quilt! There was so many good quilts that I simply forgot about taking a picture of.

Reminds me of my Sunburst quilt....

I did remember to go back and take a picture of these great mini quilts? So gorgeous. I adore the stitching details.

Fabulous detail...

 Incredible work ladies!

And stitching....

And this is such a fun, folksy flower quilt--I couldn't resist. I'm often tempted to make another big {one} flower quilt after seeing something like this. And there very far back in the picture on the right corner?

Fun folksy flower and waaay back in the corner?

Yep, it's my fire quilt. And the entire quilt was on display. In very good lighting {tho the picture doesn't do it justice}. My heart was about to beat out of my chest.

My fire quilt

And I just about started crying, blinking away tears as fast as I could--trying to control my emotions and not act like a weirdo.

Is the picture a bit fuzzy?

 'Cuz they gave me Best of Show. I know. Pretty insane huh?

'Cuz that must be you.  I can see it all perfectly....

My dad said it's validation. I just think it's amazing. {Still very unreal feeling}. And so naturally, I had to act like a stalker and go back and stare at it, over and over, for I won't tell you how many times. And I took like five? pictures of the ribbon because surely I had to be hallucinating......

Giveaway Winners, Appliqued Leaves and Why I'm Not Currently a Local Guild Member

Time to announce the winners from my 5 years of blogging giveaway! Very fun that both of them are quilt bloggers who I'm already familiar with! The first winner is Quilting Babcia from Amity Quilter blog. I will be giving her 'The 1718 Coverlet' book. The second winner, Marie from Quilt Bee, will  receive 'The Farmers Wife' book. Congratulations to the winners and thank you to everyone else for joining in on my little giveaway! Emails will also be sent to the winners.

The giveaway books!

The weekend quickly developed into quite the young peoples house party as soon as my oldest son showed up on Friday evening. He brought my youngest son back home from his two week stay in Oregon along with a couple other friends. This annual city celebration always has 3-on-3 tournament that seems very popular with the younger crowd. This year two of the teams were from my very own extended family--one adult team with my son, two brothers and a cousin, plus a high school team including my youngest son, a niece, her twin brother and one of his friends. My husband ended up being one of the court monitors and I just went to cheer things on, apply sunscreen forty-two times and wonder why this could possibly be considered fun. lol   Nevertheless, we enjoyed having our house busting at the seams with all these good-natured kids.

All the leaves appliqued down on half the quilt now!

I didn't get much quilting done as I spent a lot of time at my parents house visiting with all the siblings in town for the celebration. Mostly I pulled out my hand work bag very, very late in the evenings waiting for all the teenagers to show up or making sure the kiddos were actually settling in for the night--boys upstairs, girls downstairs! Lots of late nights for sure and for some reason I was in the mood for applique instead of hand quilting. Working on so many leaves can get a bit tedious, but really, applique of any kind {unless it's letters} can be very relaxing and meditative for me. The more I work on this eagle quilt though, the more I do think it needs another border! And I'm thinking about, uhuh, the addition of words! Such as courage, strength, victory? Stop me. I just can't seem to help myself!

Showing the quilt to some of my family members who couldn't see the
details of the quilt at the show.....

Thanks so very, very much for all of your encouraging words after my last post. For those of you who wonder why I have never joined the guild in the first place, it's fairly simple {at least in my mind}. I moved back to the area in 2004 and just happily joined back up with the same quilting group I was a part of before. We were all friends and/or family, most of us from the same church. I was a very inexperienced quilter and it felt safe, plus it was a fun group! This group gradually disbanded about 2--2 1/2 yrs. or so ago due to people moving away, getting busy with life and/or being disinterested in extra quilting projects.

Ironically, I had been considering joining the local guild prior to this years quilt show. The guild definitely appears to be declining as members are getting older and less productive. They have always been very receptive to our group as far as entering quilts into the show {perhaps because they needed the extra entries?}, but obviously are more pleased with specific styles of quilts over others. In conversation with a few of them through the years, I have deduced that the greatest emphasis is placed on technical precision, long arm quilting, and a careful, 'safe' use of fabric and color--not creativity or exploring personal style. This frankly, has made me a bit wary to be pushy about becoming a member as my focus is not exactly what they take pride in.

I will probably never know the answers to what happened this past weekend but I'm going to be okay. Truly. Ironically, my sister-in-law is the city clerk and she offered to hang the quilt in the town museum for a month if (and when) I decide I want to. Too, the paperwork is already printed out and siting on my desk to apply for entering into the NCW quilt guild show in Wenatchee, Washington.  Big step for cowardly 'ol me, but this is the show that I was supposedly asked to enter my Fire Quilt into by the visiting quilter. I may just have a little steam behind me now.*wink

I also have the papers for application of the quilt into the Washington State Quilters show in Spokane, Washington?*gulp  My husband is not really into that particular idea as he says the quilt will not be quite as relevant over there. We'll see. As I've been reminded lately, quilts have a way of being relevant almost anywhere! I do have a couple weeks to consider the idea before the application deadline arrives. Again, thank you for all the very thoughtful responses to my disappointment with the local quilt show. As always, I will do my best to respond to each one of them personally as I get time and opportunity.

A Life Learning Lesson

Back from the quilt show today. I started out this morning so excited to think of the community viewing my Fire quilt, thinking of all the possible reactions. Yeah. About that. First of all, going to drop off my quilts yesterday was a bit of a stressor. My one and only email from the quilt guild informed me that drop-off for all quilts was between 5-7 pm. on Friday, July 17 or Saturday beteween 7 and 8 am.

Me and my quilts have had a very long day....

I got there by 5:15 pm on Friday and found locked doors. After awhile, I went back home and read my email. Hmm.. Yep. Right time, right place. So I made a couple phone calls {no answer} and then went back to the building to wait. This time I noticed {through the slit in the draperies} that quilts were already hanging. Uh oh. Wow. I've only been bringing quilts to their quilt show for about eight or nine years now--this has never happened! I waited a bit and then finally went back home thinking surely someone would eventually get back to one of my messages. When they did, I found out the guild had met earlier in the day to hang the quilts, but they said they would still take my entries and those I was dropping off for a friend.

Not even this much light on my quilt and the side was crumpled
into the corner.....

Okie Dokie. It's odd not to get the word out, but I'm not part of the guild so really, they have zero obligation to inform me of any change in plans. But.... when I went to view the quilt show today, I was told that 'because I was late in getting my quilts there, they didn't have any room to hang my quilts except in the very back.' The thing is, I hadn't asked and was barely in the door! I don't expect preferential treatment when I'm not part of the guild so it was just, well, odd.

My mom and I toured the entire quilt show together and then I noticed this quilt of mine in a sort of the middle to the back quilting bay. Across from that bay, but over on the side so a little harder to get full view, was one of the quilts I had brought for my friend. Okay, not too bad considering I'm not part of the guild and was 'late' getting my quilts there. Both quilts were fairly well lit and you could see every bit of each quilt.

A couple quilting bays later {one filled with Christmas quilts} I noticed that they had lined a narrow hallway area behind the main quilting area with quilts. Mom and I wandered down through there and noticed that other than one more quilting bay {filled with antique quilts} that was all the rest of the quilts in the show--a dead end! My friends second quilt was directly beside that last quilting bay and then farther on down this narrow hallway was a couple other non-showy quilts and then finally two more of my quilts--very bad lighting and no room to see anything. Turn the corner one at a time {or shove someone into a quilt} and the hallway narrowed down even further into an isosceles triangle.

Guess where the other three quilts were? Jammed into that little corner with the Fire Quilt right up at the narrow point. You can see more of the quilt in the previous picture here on my blog than you could see of it at the quilt show! Crazy huh? The light was behind all these quilts because they were directed toward the main part of the quilt show so it was very shadowy and dark. This made it completely impossible to read the bottom {almost 5" tall} letters on my quilt. The lettering on the baskets were also indecipherable and because of the fact that the quilt was crammed into a corner, we couldn't get far enough back to 'see' the quilt as a whole. Or a half? If I stood all the way against the wall across from my quilt, I could reach out my hands and touch the quilt. Wow. Just wow.

Okay. Thinking back, They said I was 'late' for the drop off. Combing local papers, I found a July 13, 2015 notice to the public, never mind an email.  'The guild is accepting entries for the show. Entries must be dropped off at the Pateros Central Building between 7 and 8 a.m. Saturday.

Check. I got there in plenty of time. Hmm... Apparently they had two empty slots for quilts in the middle/back part of the quilt show for some reason. Right? Otherwise how did they find room for two of my late arriving quilts. Oh. Maybe they actually moved a couple quilts? Rearranged some? Again. I don't expect preferential treatment, I'm just glad to see my quilts hung with other community members quilts {and guild politics can probably be brutal}. But why those two and not my fire quilt? Really?

Honestly I felt kind of shunned. It was the only 'Pateros' quilt. It was the only 'Fire' Quilt. It was the only one of its kind and it felt really in tune with the entire memorial theme of the weekend. First anniversary of the fire! Thank you everyone who helped last year! Yay! We survived! Everywhere you turned there was something about the whole fire anniversary and the guild didn't think my quilt was relevant enough to put it out where we could actually see it? My two nieces toured the quilt show and couldn't find more than my one {well lit} quilt until they came back later with my daughter, who showed them the rest of the quilts hiding in the back. How many other people didn't realize there were quilts back there? My oldest daughter told me she couldn't take my pictures, there simply wasn't room and the lighting was horrible. It just seemed pointless.

It was crazy. It was terribly disappointing and I just wanted to cry. When I picked up my quilts late in the afternoon, two different women from the guild very nicely told me to bring it back next year and they would hang it up front where more people could see it. I was just scratching my head. Why tell me that when I was saying NOTHING. I made no complaints, agreed that I was late, never made a single frowny face or asked why they HID my quilt. Seriously, I think if they had really wanted to, they could have/would have/should have? hung it where they put my other quilt {the only one of mine that you could clearly see}. I certainly wouldn't have minded. There was obviously room in that spot for largish quilt. But that's where they chose to put the fun looking floral quilt.

So.... this elephant in the room suggests that this was on purpose because, why? Honestly, I wonder if this quilt was one little veto away from being left in the bag it arrived in! Wow. This is a non juried, no awards quilt show, no guidelines whatsoever for entry. The guild, however, is very traditional and I think maybe I pushed one too many boundaries? Were they uncomfortable with the quilt? Obviously. Were they embarrassed by it being in their conventional 'safe' quilt show? I don't know. I did have one very nice guild woman inform me that a visitor from a larger town requested that I be told 'they would love to have that particular quilt displayed in their show'. And now I think--why not? That particular show makes sure that every single quilt is given respect and is well hung, plus well lit. Is that too much to ask?

It was a very disappointing day. I've always heard that you can't expect to take quilts {outside of the norm} to a traditional quilt show and feel happy about the experience. Today I learned the truth of that even though they've always treated me fairly before. There's been times that I didn't receive any feedback on my quilts--that's okay. In fact {to get a glimpse of how shaken I was}, I even asked my mom to tell me the truth of the matter. Is my quilt really that pathetic? Am I kidding myself? I personally think my craftsmanship is excellent, the story isn't offensive, crude or vulgar, the quilt has pleasing colors and more importantly, it is relevant topic right here,right now. Am I blind?  You know I can't believe any of you because you're my very best cheering squad.*wink

 And you know what they say, whomever 'they' are.... Pride goeth before a fall......

**So yeah, go ahead and weigh in on this, but please try not to bash the guild too much. They truly are nice people and I live in a very small community.

The Fire Quilt is FINISHED

**My giveaway is still open! Okay, here you go. It's time for picture overload with this quilt! My quilt holders were all at work or on vacation, so I don't have a really good pic of the entire quilt yet. Maybe later in the week? The bottom of the quilt has entirely faded into the shadows so I'll apologize for that as it makes the rest look weirdly proportioned.

2014 Fire in Pateros Quilt
Things Will Never Be the Same

I have to be patient and wait until my family has time help me though. Meanwhile, I thought you might want to see some stitching detail as it really made the quilt so much better. At least to me. You might think it's an odd quilt with or without the stitching and I won't judge you for that. lol

Stitching detail to the left

I ended up using very light colors of Perle cotton on most of the quilt. So surprising as I usually would think to use a bright or contrasting color. I would try out about three or four colors before finding the 'right' look on almost every single panel, stitching and then pulling the entire thread out and starting over. It was very frustrating as it took a long time for me to feel like I was 'getting' what the quilt required. At one point I was almost in tears thinking I was clearly wasting my time making the effort to hand quilt this monster! Anyway, the primary colors of the stitching are a very light silvery gray, a light multi-colored blue, a med-light green and and med-light blue. Go figure--the only strong colors were just a touch of red and black thread in very tiny areas of the quilt!

Stitching detail to the right

In the end, I decided that the texture was what was needed, not the color as more color just seemed to busy things up. Plenty of that with this quilt already! There was absolutely no marking done on this quilt before I stitched. It's all eyeballed and a naturally uneven style of stitching, although I stitched along the line of the plaid behind the 'Pateros' letters etc. It just seemed that this quilt needed the human touch more than precisely measured stitching lines.

What the quilt is all about

Honestly, it was really difficult to decide how and where to add the stitching. I almost had a panic attack over that part until I just did what I always do. Get the quilt into a hoop and start stitching something! The point of stitching is to add depth and texture to a quilt, draw your eye in or out, right? I finally went with an echo quilting around the vague looking flower in the center {why I was attempting to use a floor hoop} and then outlined the inside of each of the baskets. On each side panel, I stitched with a red thread just outside each 'spark' or ember and then used the light silvery gray thread to stitch concentric circles until they ran into each other--but not overlapping. I didn't get it all stitched quite as smoothly as possible where they butted up against each other, but there was only so much I was willing to be fussy about. Seriously, the stitching could have taken months if I had decided to be particular about every single detail!

Middle detail

I do think the quiet look of the stitching was needed to fully bring it to life. It's hard to have an unbiased opinion about something I've poured so much of myself into though! I feel immense relief to have it finished and yet, when I laid it out on the floor to view {and lets be honest, critique as well}, I felt so much numbness that I couldn't quite take it in properly. It almost looked like a stranger to me, and here it had taken up so many hours of my time since last October!

Lower left side

 My husband insisted we show it to my parents immediately and they seemed truly touched by the quilt. They spent quite a bit of time trying to capture all the details, asking questions as they looked over it. Showing them helps me to feel a tiny bit less nervous about putting it out there before the community. It also clarifies how emotional this quilt could be for others.*gulp  I'm really hopeful there will be other quilts with a similar idea! It would be very interesting to view different perspectives of the same theme and also take the pressure off of mine.....

Can never quite get the entire bottom of quilt

I've been gathering all the quilts I intend to put in the show this weekend. It's hard to narrow it down to the four or five I generally enter, especially since last years quilt show was cancelled! So far I've narrowed it down to these six quilts, but I could change my mind.

A stack of quilts for the local quilt show

In gathering quilts together, I realized that hmm.... I haven't put labels on anything unless it was given away for oh, maybe two years? Bad girl.

Simple labels

I did my usual and used a piece of muslin with simple wording. Even on the fire quilt. I feel like the details are mine and as far as others are concerned, it's more important that they interpret the details in their own way and from their own experiences? Looks like I got the date wrong on the Fire quilt, but luckily all I have to do is add a one in front of the three! Lovely to get the guilt of not adding labels to my quilts done and over with though. One more thing checked off the list! My quilt is done. I can hardly believe it......

Slow Stitching Time

Well, I'm back at it. Got to get some stitches into this quilt in order to see it hanging at the quilt show! My husband and I attempted to have a get-away anniversary weekend and ended up having it cut very short.

Thinking this would work

Sometimes life throws a curve ball doesn't it? So we're having a quiet evening together at home, me with my hoop of course. I started out several days ago with a radiating stitching pattern right smack in the middle of the quilt top. It seemed like a good idea to use the floor hoop until, well, I actually started stitching.

Feeling how very much better this works

I could feel my frustration level rising every time I attempted to get myself into position. You know, to make some decent looking stitches? Left hand ready to push the needle back up into a kinda, sort of rocking motion? 

In case you were wondering, short people and floor hoops don't always work well together. It was with much relief that I finished that particular section and moved on to an area that would fit into my lap hoop. Ahhh.... Now I can feel myself starting to relax into the quilt. That's the way it should always be.... Time to link up to Kathy's Slow Sunday Stitching!

Working Through the Emotion

Okay, here's the quilt that has been consuming all my time. It's the quilt about the fire that happened in our town approximately 10 months ago, all the fraught emotion for free. There's a lot of layers and subtleties to this quilt and honestly, I just don't have the time or heart to walk you through every detail right now. And after this is done, let me tell you, it's back to quilting just for fun around here!

The day it started for us....

Plus, I'm still wondering if I'll actually hit 'publish' on this post. It's just one of those quilts that seems kind of intensely crazy for people that weren't actually here. Ahh... so dramatic. It's not like the town was bombed or people died.

Some feelings and emotion...

No, but we lost things. Like our innocence that bad things never happen in our small town, USA. We lost our confidence that when it comes to structures and towns with a low profile, that state fire crews actually care. You think this would have been allowed to happen to a large tourist town? I think not.

So much love and support....

I get upset at the uselessness of it all. Yeah, yeah, nature was doing its thing at a whole new level. I do get that. Wow, do I get that. But there was definitely some communication problems and some mismanagement. We saw soooooo many firemen just standing and watching. Not local firefighters. They were killing themselves off trying to save everything. It was insane.

The whole event was just unreal and it will always stay with us in one way or another. I didn't actually lose my home, but I will never forget those 20-30 minutes of running through the house grabbing up the 'important items', trying to find my youngest son, driving forever to get somewhere safe, and then laying awake during the night thinking about what I wasn't able to take, and even more, worried about everything and everyone. Going back to the house the next day and seeing things fallen on the floor that I was sure were in the suburban and safe. Being on evacuation notice for days after where we were staying with friends. Wondering if a random spark would go ahead and catch fire on our house the next day like it did our cousins house. Should I be taking more out of the house and if so, where would be safe to store it? Worrying about my parents and all they were dealing with, what they were going to do.

Something I'll never forget....

My mom, dad, sister, mother-in-law, cousins, and so many people we knew didn't have the opportunity to go back into their houses because theirs was already in ashes and smoldering. Not just burnt a little, but practically incinerated. It was so unreal. What and how to take care of that, especially the uninsured? Driving through town and seeing friends and neighbors looking in shock and grief at the home they'd lived in all their life. All the tears. All the devastation and trauma. It felt like a bad movie, but instead, they've had to wake up to their new reality every day since. Second guess why they were worried about clearing the table instead of grabbing their pictures.

The whole quilt minus another little flame in the right corner...

So yes, 'Things will never be the same'. And they might be better someday. You never know. To some it is already better in a few ways. My mom and dad moved into their new home a couple weeks ago and it's nicer than anything they've ever lived in. Pretty fantastic actually, if you think losing 40 yrs. worth of stuff you've worked hard for is a good trade off. I'm thinking not as the stress has aged them tremendously and there are things that can never be replaced. We feel very blessed that nobody died. Extremely thankful as it could have happened so easily. There's just so many little stories winding their way through this quilt, but as you can see, I get all emotional just thinking about it. A little angry and maybe even a bit bitter. I need to work on that obviously.

We'll never forget the outpouring of love from people everywhere. The donations and the help. It was simply incredible and very touching. Our lives have been changed since this event and hopefully this quilt has helped me work through the worst of the feelings. It's all pin basted and ready to start stitching now although I'm shaking my head at what to do and where to start. It's been like that all along with this quilt. 'What do I do now?' The quilt show is the day after the first anniversary of the fire. That's my goal. Better get something figured out soon.*wink