Historical Stitching

I am still helping my daughter who had a knee replaced 1 1/2 weeks ago.  I don't have my quilt with me, but I do have my computer so all is not lost.

This is a good time to look back in history at the sewing of a past era.  Women seem to have been driven to sew from the beginning of time.  Maybe it started with utilitarian purpose, but in time those who had spare moments in their lives stitched for pleasure and beauty.  Little girls were taught embroidery skills at a very young age.  I taught my daughters to sew when they were young, but in this day and age they don't have to unless they want to.  They didn't all take to it, but three of my girls are accomplished quilters.

I digress.  I gave one daughter a beautiful piece of embroidery that was done by an direct ancestress of mine named Helen (Boteler) Chernocke who lived from 1671-1741 in England.

Helen (Boteler) Chernocke

 There is a story about the portrait.  The child is probably named Pynsent after his father,  and he died young after playing with "lucifers" (matches).  He may have been the oldest son as some years later they named another son Pynsent.

The embroidery is so lovely and in such amazingly great condition, though there is some age-related damage.  It was originally a cushion cover that was not meant to be sat upon.  It may have been for a special chair - we can only speculate.  The motifs were outlined in coiled gold.  This was very thin, real gold wrapped around silk thread and couched to the background.  The gold is mostly gone now, but there are a few specks of it.  The thread around which it was coiled is red.

Helen's lovely embroidery.

We looked into repairing it, but the experts say not to try as today's threads are too strong and will damage the old fabric and stitching.  There are people who work on things like this, but we have not contacted them.  My daughter has it carefully covered with muslin and stores it flat.  I have one or two more pieces that are more damaged than this.

I thought you might like to see the kind of work that was done at that time by women who had time on their hands.  I get my interest in sewing honestly!

Sew a happy seam this week.  I hope you enjoy this week's diversion.

Quilting as Therapy

I have been swamped with year end stuff and the birthdays of several family members.  I always write my annual letter in January to avoid the confusion of the holidays.  This year I am rushed even more to get it done before my daughter's knee surgery.  I MUST get all this stuff done and my week already has two out-of-house days.

I am really finding out what my daily quilting does for me because I am not doing any right now.  What do you gain from quilting?  These are the things I treasure:

**The challenge.  There is always something to challenge our capabilities.  There is something     new to learn.  There is something new to try.  There is something to think about and puzzle out.

**I love the opportunity to be creative.  Design a quilt.  Design a quilting pattern.  Choose colors. Figure out how to put a quilt together both design-wise and technical-wise.

**Many quilting tasks require repetition where you have to pay attention with some intensity.  Even monotonus tasks leave me more relaxed when I finish.  The satisfaction of progress is a real upper.  As you go over the same thing time and time again your mind has time to wander and think about things in your life to the music of the motor.  

**There is pleasure and happiness in finishing a task or completing a quilt.  I love to go back to look at what I have done.  Sometimes I see things that need fixing, but mostly it is gratifying to see something accomplished and looking pretty.

After a session of quilting I am ready to quit for awhile - until the next day anyhow!  It somehow leaves me feeling a little like I do after good exercise session.  I find that the little worries of life go away for awhile, leaving me more willing to face and deal with them.

You have heard it before:  Work on a quilt and say goodbye you your therapist.  Works for me!

The quilt below is sitting on my machine waiting for attention.  I turned it over and the light from the window highlighted the texture of the quilting.  The other side has color, but the back is different sort of vision.  On the front some of the quilting doesn't show much, but the back says it all.

Quilting from the back.

Sew a happy seam this week.  I wish you joy in your quilting.

Aftermath

We spent three weeks in Seattle celebrating, visiting, eating too much and just plain having fun with family.  We always drive and weather has never slowed down DH who is a frustrated truck driver I think.  He loves the challenge, but is a careful driver.  We pushed through fog, snow, slush and ice where many cars were in ditches.  Occasionally we hit some clear road and a little sunshine.  It was tense driving in many places, but we arrived safely to discover 12 inches of snow on the drive and much more in the snow plow dump at the street.  So, in the dark, we dragged out the shovels and began moving enough to pull the truck in to the drive.  It was an exhausting arrival and I am still functioning at three quarters my normal energy level.

I have much to do before I take on the care of my daughter as she recovers from knee replacement surgery so I don't plan to do any sewing until I get some priority things accomplished:  birthday cards to make, annual letter to get out, photos uploaded with pictures to add to the letter, and on and on....  I am posting today just to keep in touch and to let you know that I have not fallen off the edge.  I am eager to get restarted on my quilt, but since there is no deadline it sits and warms the sewing machine.

On top of the the original 12 inches, we now have an additional 12 of new snow.  It is stunningly beautiful, but sooooooo cold at -5º.  Although Dixie loves the snow, she doesn't want to walk in the freezing weather.  Neither do I!

Dixie watching.

Sew a happy seam this week.  I am envious, but wish you the best.

Happy New Year!

The title says it all.  Have a great celebration followed by a year of happiness and good health.  These kids know how to celebrate.  It was just hard to get them to hold still long enough for a photo.

Back to sewing soon!

Merry Christmas

Although my greeting is in the Christian tradition, I wish everyone Happy Holidays in recognition that quilters come in all faiths.  It is a joyous time of year for all.

Holidays

Wind is blowing, snow is falling and the cozy house is summoning.  The hectic time of year is here with  shopping, decorating, wrapping, baking, etc.  No time to sew in the next three weeks.  No time to blog in that same interval.  I leave my blog open with photos instead.  I hope you enjoy.  This photo was taken by my sister.  Yes, that is me snowshoeing in the magnificent mountains where I live.

Rocky Mountain National Park.

How Fierce is Your Bulldog?

All kinds of people make quilts.  Some are more motivated than others about different parts of the process.  The vast majority of us make quilts for pleasure and the amount of time and care spent meets individual needs and goals.  What about quilting gives you pleasure?

I know a person who decided she didn't want to spend time being really careful.  She said, "I am not going to worry about points anymore."  So she doesn't worry about the tip of a point that gets a little clipped.  Her quilts are beautiful.  She makes quilts to be used and washed frequently and we all love them.  They do not have to be perfect in every detail.  That's OK.

Some make quilts for charity using donated fabrics.  The perfection seen in these quilts runs the gamut from quick to time consuming.  One lady told me that this allows her to do the sewing she loves without having to spend her money on fabric.  The important aspect of this kind of quilting is the potential to sell and raise funds for charity and from that is derived additional pleasure and accomplishment.

There are many talented quilters who make a business of quilting.  Those with longarm machines see tremendous variation in the quality of their customers' quilts.  Some clearly have no knowledge of "proper" techniques and their blocks don't even meet at the seams, but they love doing it or they are doing it for love.  Other customers pay to have beautifully constructed quilts quilted by a professional.  Still others prefer to do it all themselves, not wanting to share the glory, so to speak.  Pattern-makers transpose their quilts onto paper that others can make the same quilt.

I have one daughter who wanted to join the family enclave of quilters.  She made the attempt, but came to me one day to say, "Mom, I'm sorry, but I just don't enjoy quilting."  I am sorry she put that pressure on herself, but her considerable, artistic talents show in every other area of her life.  She just doesn't like to sew.

There are some of us who have fierce inner bulldogs and go above and beyond to achieve perfection. This can be frustrating because it is an unattainable goal.  So goes my quilting with a lot of ripping last week.  Why?:

• I wasn't satisfied with what I had done.
• I tried a new idea on the actual quilt because I didn't have a suitable tester on which to work (quilting the spiral).  I saw a portion of it that could turn into a more interesting sub-design.  Satisfied now and glad I re-did it.
• I stitched a bunch of motifs with the wrong color thread.  Just plain careless.  

I have an insatiable bulldog in me, but I still can't achieve perfection.  It's the same when playing piano.  There are some small glitches here and there that I consider too small to bother with considering the time it takes to rip carefully.  I have been known to use permanent marker to hide a small defect where possible. However, if a glitch bothers me I leave it overnight, and if it still bothers me by the next afternoon I pull out my ripper and redo it.

Ripping is really time consuming because you have to pull out enough loose thread beyond the defect  to tie off the ends on both sides.  Then more ends to tie in after you re-stitch the affected area.  Sometimes it is worth it and other times it is not.  How do I rip?  It depends.

• For quick and easy (not much danger of damage) I use the seam ripper to cut about every third stitch, top or bottom.  Then I yank the uncut thread from the other side and all comes undone.  The downside is a lot of tiny pieces of thread from the cut side.

Pretty obvious right?

• If you need to preserve enough thread to tie off the ends, use the seam ripper to cut one stitch on top and one on the bottom and then carefully pull the thread out of every stitch.  Sometimes you can pull two or three stitches out at a time without breaking the thread.  When you have enough out to tie a knot, do so and bury it.

• For really touchy spots where there may be other thread in the way such as SID work or tiny stitches I do one stitch at a time, using the top thread to pull the bobbin thread loop to the top , then slip the top thread out of the loop.  This can be done from the back if  you choose.  This is slow, but very safe.

Once the loop is up (red), pull the green thread free of the loop.
Do the same for each stitch.

Sew a happy seam this week.  I wish you no reverse sewing.