Last night I sat down in front of the TV, teed up The Moonflower Murders (not as good as The Magpie Murders but still enjoyable); made myself a thermos of tea, and set up a little TV tray with my sewing machine on it, and another with my iron and a towel as an ironing pad on that one.
Rather oddly, I find myself making a quilt.
I was beavering away, sewing tiny pieces of wool together, listening to the TV and occasionally looking at it. At one point I looked up, and discovered I had an audience.
She is SO. CUTE! ❤️
So, how did I come to be making a quilt, you ask?
How long a story do you want?!? 😂
You may remember that I'm a blabber, so the shortest version I can give you, is that about four years ago, I found a bunch of wool in my stash, and realized I either needed to donate it, or do something with it. I decided to make myself a hand quilted wool quilt, like the ones I grew up with.
I cleverly chose to do rather large-ish squares, but by the time all that hand-sewing was done, I was really over it, so I decided to hand-tie it rather than quilt it. And though I wasn't thrilled with the quilt itself (the colour scheme wasn't very me) I loved the result!
Several months after I made it though, my elderly cat developed urinary incontinence, and I'm sure you can see where this is going.
Eventually, I had to throw it out, as nothing would remove the smell permanently. It would seem to be gone, but it always came back. So that was the end of that, and the end of my quiting forays, I thought.
I had really wanted a wool quilt, as I had moved away from wanting to do something *different* than my aunties and grandmothers and great grandmothers, to wanting to stand in a line with them, and be part of something that stretched back hundreds of years.
However, long-time readers know that I have a few *dozen* quilts, and am in no need of anymore.
So I thought my wool quilt would have to be an emotional connection to my forbearers, without any physical proof of it, and that would have to be enough.
Cut to, this past Saturday, I was scrolling through my neighbourhood group on Facebook, and I saw a post from a woman who was giving away her mother's fabric stash. Her mother is now quite elderly, and no longer able to use it.
My neighbour posted several pictures. I gathered from them that her mom was a rug hooker, as her entire stash was wool, and mostly cut up into strips. The fabric itself, her daughter told me, was culled from old clothing.
Amongst the bags that she posted though, I saw one of fairly large chunks of royal blue and red. I asked her if I could have that one as I immediately thought about making a quilt for my grandson.
(Oh right, life update: my oldest son got married in 2019, BSP and I split up in 2020, Maggie (cat, 19), Jessie (cat, 19), Tyler (*much beloved dog, 17) all passed away within the same year and a half; two years later I got Riley (pictured); and I now have two grandchildren, a granddaughter (3.5) and a grandson (nearly 2). There! You're all caught up! 😉
So, I get to this woman's house on Sunday, and it turns out her mother's stash is VAST.
Huge bags went all the way down the hallway from the front door to the kitchen, as well as dozens more taking up half of her daughter's living room!
She had set aside the bag that I requested, but invited me to take a look.
As noted, almost all of it was cut into strips, but I saw a coat lining's worth of *this* gorgeousness thankfully uncut:
- clearly not enough for a quilt, but with some judicious additions, I think it could make an absolutely stunning throw for my bed, which is upholstered in that gorgeous rusty orange colour.
And I also saw this bag of REALLY! PRETTY!!! sage green and white plaid.
My inner fabric dragon said "It must be mine!", and my inner swamp witch said "Cut it! Cut it! Cut it now!", while dancing with joy. Lol
It was packaged in a bag with this equally beautiful soft cream wool, in exactly the same weight as the plaid. So I scooped it all up and ran home with my booty, like the "START THE CAR!!!" woman in that long-ago IKEA commercial.
I checked it all over, and it was clean, with no moth, but musty smelling, so I aired all of it out all day and night on Monday on a line on my balcony; and brought it in to dry (it snowed on Monday) all day Tuesday.
On Tuesday night, I quieted the swamp witch (who hadn't stopped yelling since Sunday) by cutting it up. She was utterly delighted.
And that's how, last night, I ended up doing this:
I will assemble the blocks tonight, and then I'll put it aside for awhile, because there won't be enough blocks to make a queen sized quilt, (I'll have 15 nine inch blocks when I'm done).
So I'll need to find other fabrics to bulk it out, and I don't imagine I'll find them immediately.
The little swamp witch wants me to embroider cream blocks with yellow flowers. (Wood sorrel, or possibly goldenrod?); but that would be crazy, right? Right? 🤣
So after I've assembled these wool blocks, I'll put them away and have a think.
Aren't you glad I told you the *short* version?
Lol
Talk to you soon-ish?
Until then, be kind to yourself and others. It's a tough old world out there.
Xo, Kit
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