on quilting...

I've decided that I can do this kind of quilting. To be true to the craft, I don't think it is really called quilting. More like binding fabric together. I actually almost enjoy it. What's not to like, picking out beautiful fabrics, sewing in straight lines, and a little hand sewing and ta da, done in a day. Well, that's actually not exactly true. I do like assembling the quilt top together, as long as everything is already cut out ( for me - did I really write that? pre-cut...naaah). At the moment, I have a nearly quilted project using some of gorgeous Love by Amy Butler, but it's just sitting behind my machine in a nicely folded pile. See, I decided to try the freehand quilting. I don't know if it's my machine, the pure action of needing to change feet and put on my walking foot, then the other attachment to do the quilting, or the sheer size of the quilt to be, and how I can't move the quilt around easily or really see what I am doing, or the thickness of the layers. But, it frustrates me. I really like to do a bit of freestyle quilting, a squiggly line here and there on smaller projects, but on this large scale, I don't think it's for me. It was a real surprise to find that I didn't mind quilting in a structured pattern. Parallel and perpendicular lines for me anytime.

Here's essentially a yard quilt. Very cute, and boyish. Boy...it's hard to find boy stuff.

And...don't get me started on blind stitching the binding. Let me just say that for me...it's not relaxing. But, I probably haven't done it enough. Like my daughter recently told daddy, "so is it like when you first do it you don't like it very much, but then you get better and easier and then it's not so bad and you like it?. Hmmmm maybe I should be taking that advice.