Even as a young girl, I was fascinated with quilts. My maternal grandmother died a number of years before I was born, but one of the few remembrances my mother had of her was a wedding ring quilt that my grandmother had pieced. As soon as I learned how to sew, I helped my mother and my aunt, neither of whom took the time for complicated patterns, to sew four-patch and nine-patch blocks that we combined into everyday quilts that kept us warm on long, cold winter nights. These quilts were always made from the scraps of material left over from clothes we had made or from usable pieces of wornout clothes. When as a teenager, I started filling my hope chest, I included several quilt tops I had pieced. Later, I completed quilts as Christmas presents for various nieces and nephews. I still stuck to the standard and easy four- and nine-patch blocks.
In recent years, I have expanded my interest in quilts to include more complicated patterns. I have been brave enough to experiment with completely hand-pieced and hand-quilted work where before I had done everything on the sewing machine. I have done a lot of reading, both in books and on the internet, about the history of quilts and have come to have a great appreciation of their planning and construction not only as a practical household skill but also as a true art form. My favorite quilt block pattern is the Attic Windows Block. The avatar I use for this blog is a graphic representation of that block.
Quilts and quilted items make wonderful hand-crafted gifts for Christmas and other special occasions. If you are skillful and quick, with ample free time, then you may still be able to do a complete quilt, either bed size or lap size, for one or more of your loved ones. There are other ways to employ this skill in the making of gifts, though, that will take less time to complete. Quilt blocks can be utilized to make potholders, purses, bookbags, diaper bags, table runners, and place mats, just to mention a few uses. If you have a friend or relative who has become interested in learning to quilt, then instead of completing a project as a gift for that person, make up a kit for her (or him) to complete. Choose a pattern and the fabric in which to work it, cut out the different needed pieces, print out instructions for assembling the block(s), and include a backing fabric, batting, and binding. For a younger person, you might make up a kit for a quilted potholder, for an older teen, a purse or tote bag, and for an adult or more skilled teen, a lap quilt.
There are lots of websites dedicated to quilts and quilt patterns and instructions. My favorite is the Quilt Blocks Galore site. It has a huge list of blocks, and when you click on the name and illustration of a block, you find detailed instructions and illustrations for cutting and assembling each block and combining the blocks into a complete quilt. It can be found at:
http://www.quilterscache.com/QuiltBlocksGalore.html
The Block Central web site has free patterns and instructions, coloring pages for the individual blocks that you can print out and color to try out different color schemes, a blog, forums, and a Quilt Directory to different web sites about quilts. Its address is:
http://www.blockcentral.com/index.shtml
The Free Quilt patterns website also contains an alphabetical listing of quilting websites. It can be found at:
http://www.freequiltpatterns.info/
Other useful sites are:
http://www.mccallsquilting.com/qb/index.html
http://www.quilt.com/Blocks/AlphaBlockList.html
http://henriettashandbags.com/Craft_Ideas.html
http://home.howstuffworks.com/quilted-pot-holder-patterns.htm
http://www.bellaonline.com/articles/art4982.asp
Finally, there are two quilting shows that air on AETN Channel 2 every Saturday morning. The first is Fons and Porter's Love of Quilting, which airs at 7:30 A. M., followed by Lap Quilting with Georgia Bonesteel, airing at 8:00 A. M. Sewing with Nancy follows these two at 8:30 A. M. and while it is a general information sewing show, it does sometimes do quilt segments. The websites for these three are:
http://www.fonsandporter.com/aspx/fonsandporter/default.aspx
http://www.georgiabonesteel.com/
http://www.wpt.org/sewingwithnancy/
If you are an experienced quilter, I hope that the above information will provide you with some new inspiration. If you are interested but just beginning, then I think you will find instructions here that will take away a lot of the mystery of creating beautiful fabric art. Until next time, happy rummaging.
