shadows and light

"Where there is light there must be shadow, where there is shadow there must be light. There is no shadow without light and no light with out shadow."

--Haruki Murakami, 1Q84

I cannot shake these words. Too often, I am a black or white thinker -- the whole world, today, forever, past and future, is either light or dark. How hard it is to grasp that we need our shadows in order to shine. We are all bursts of sunlight into the dusty, unswept corners of the world, and we are all smudges of thunder on the summer evening skies. Simultaneously.

This quilt -- still just a top -- was born from that thought. A translation of words into fabric.



Spot the red?

(A selection of these blacks available as a bundle at WestwoodAcres)

the quilt that entertains your kids: an eye-spy tutorial

An eye-spy quilt is simply a design that features a large range of novelty prints, from animals to vehicles, people to plants -- anything that can be "spotted". For this latest quilt, though, I decided to take the game one step further and make a physical, hold-in-your-hand checklist of some of the quilt's landmark prints.



In case you'd like to use the idea for your next eye-spy quilt, too, here's how I put mine together.

Materials:
Several squares of novelty fabrics to be used in the quilt
Printer paper
A scanner
Laminating supplies (optional)

What to do:
1. Place your fabric squares in the scanner, face down. Scan each one, and save them on your computer.



2. Open Pages (or your word processing program of choice). Create a new blank document.

3. Drag in each of your scanned fabric images. I chose to lay them out in a grid, but it would also work to have them positioned vertically, like a list.

(Tip: In Pages, you can add one image, and then save your document as a template. Close and reopen your document. Duplicate the first image as many times as necessary, and then drag each subsequent image onto one of the duplicates. This makes each image the same exact size. You might know an easier way to do this already, though...!)



4. (Optional) Add a textbox under each image, with a description of the fabric.

5. Print. I chose to laminate the sheets, so that the images can be crossed off with a dry-erase marker when found, and then the sheets can be wiped clean and reused.

Perfect for rainy-day or sick-in-bed entertainment!

in progress: inverted +++

Just a little peek at what's up on the design wall (um, kitchen wall) today. The black and white obsession continues.

I've put together this collection of "high-volume" blacks over the last month or so, with a Before the Dawn bundle from WestwoodAcres, and a lovely parcel from the stash of generous Bijou Lovely.

may, a reflection

May has been a month of transformation.

As I find a few minutes today to plan June's direction, I want to pause and reflect on the lessons of the last month, and share them here -- for you, and for me. There's something about telling others something that helps me to tell myself the same thing!


The Power of The Written Word



At the beginning of the month, I wrote down several goals, the most tangible of which being "I want people to send me free fabric." I'm almost embarrassed to share such a shallow desire, but what I've found this month is that there are people -- fabric designers, sewing blogs, shops, quilting magazines -- who love nothing better than to send out fabric to anyone willing to sew with it.

So now I'm writing it all down -- no matter how crazy the goal seems!



The Importance of Staying True to One's Self



Last month, I made two quilts for charity auctions -- the events were within a week of each other, and the quilts each sold for the same amount. And yet, one of the quilts I felt so happy with, and the other gave me a sort of queasy feeling -- that though I was so happy to help a friend, I was making something against my own aesthetic.

I read Seth Godin's wonderful article about this -- pandering to other people's taste -- which gave me the words to describe that uneasiness. (The author descries pandering as "using your perception of your customer's wishes as an excuse to do work you're not proud of", stating that "merely giving the people what they want is a shortcut to banality, mediocrity and invisibility.")

Now, I feel much more comfortable saying no -- there simply isn't time to spend on work that doesn't make your heart sing. Someone else might find joy in doing those things that don't fit you. 



The Joy of Collaboration



On the other hand, I had such a wonderful experience working with my friend Leah on the Sunshine and Clouds quilt -- her vision for random colour was a creative challenge that pushed me to evaluate my colour choices more deeply. Similarly, working on the Solid Strings quilt, in preparation for another collaborative project, has been a lovely means of connection, and again, a challenge that expanded my usual tendencies.


The Need for Play

 
And between all of this work -- this sewing for others, with rules and deadlines -- I've found that I need to have hours off, simply to play with fifty shades of zipper. Otherwise, really, what's the point?

sunshine and clouds

Usually, I'm very controlled with my colour choices, allowing myself one or two main colours only, and a generous portion of grey and white. For this quilt, though, the request was for "randomly colourful" -- a delight to have free-reign over all of my fabrics, and yet a challenge to my controlled aesthetic. Several times, I sent off a preview of the layout, and my lovely friend responded, oh-so-kindly, with encouragement to randomise it further.

In the end, what I found it helpful to do was to create an image in my head -- a cool, cloudy day, with glimpses of the blue sky and rays of sunshine smiling through. And then, surprise! A hot air balloon appears on the horizon, and then two, and suddenly the sky is dotted with colour.

Backing this one with a giant piece of Lotta Jansdotter's new line, Glimma, felt very extravagant -- I loved the touch of grey binding with all that yellow. And, as a special little addition, I made an eye-spy sheet (or three -- one for each little boy) to accompany the quilt. With so many animals, vehicles and little people prints, there's a lot to be found!

A pleasure to work in so many colours, for a change!

solid strings

This quilt, made with long strips of lovely Kona solids, was inspired by a mixture of the Gee's Bend quilters, and a page from Dr. Seuess's "Oh, the Places You'll Go". Pull out your copy, and have a flip through to see if you can find which page. Hint: it's stripey!

Penny loves it. High-contrast and all that. It makes me think of summers at the English seaside, and walks along the promenade lined with beach-huts.

So far, just the top is done, but I'm imagining row upon row of close, straight lines quilted along the stripes.

planning for the possibility of time

We're all asked "where do you find the time?" for something. Sewing, reading, baking, exercising, cleaning -- to fit anything else into an already-full life is a balancing act. Whether or not these 'extras' happen depends upon us being prepared for that window of time we may or may not get.

I met a friend (and her four children) at the park the other day. She was dressed head-to-toe in work-out gear -- work-out shirt, shorts, shoes -- and pushing a high-tech, aero-dynamic pushchair. I asked if she'd just been running. No. About to go running? No. "But if I put on all my running clothes in the morning," she said, "then I might find a chance to run before the day is over. If I don't put them on, I definitely won't go."

And I think perhaps we can all apply that thinking to our desire to do something -- when we wake up in the morning, we must plan for the possibility of having time. If we're already "dressed", physically or mentally, surely we're more likely to spring into action when the heavens align and a little free time arrives. We're also able to utilise smaller amounts of time -- ten minutes can easily be wasted away by preparations, but if you're ready for it, that ten minutes becomes useful.

Here are some ways I find helpful to be prepared for time to sew.

1. Think bigger than your time.
Twenty minutes is not enough to make a quilt. Or a dress. Or much of anything. But twenty minutes a day, over time, becomes substantial. Don't let your time limits today prevent you from starting that big project. You don't need to work out how it'll get finished. Once you start it, finishing becomes easy.

2. Leave things incomplete.
It's much quicker to start on something that is already in progress, as you don't need to spend much time planning. I tend to leave a pile of things that are ready to be trimmed, pinned, or sewn together ready for the next day, as these are things I can jump right into the moment a little time arises. Of course, if you don't have anything on the go, it's also great to begin something new -- just leave yourself something incomplete ready for the next day!

3. Make organising easy. 
I'm rubbish at taking the time to organise when that same time might be used to create, and so have found very simple ways to keep things visible and ordered. For example, I use a lot of 4" and 5" squares, and so I have a bowl for each size on the bookshelf. They are not particularly pretty bowls or neat piles, but so much time is saved by being able to grab the right size each time without sorting.

4. Build up a supply of prepared materials. 
Pre-cutting squares (in fabrics and sizes you often like to work with) can make piecing a quilt top very quick. In general, if I use up most of a fabric on something, I cut the remainder into 4" and 5" squares and add them to the bowls.

4. Keep fabrics "roughly sorted". 
Every now and then, when things get into such a mess that the drawers don't open, I go through and fold things properly. But in between, I find that what works for me is not wasting time doing neat folding every time I use a fabric, but keeping the fabrics orderly enough (i.e. grouped by colours) that I can find what I want quickly.

5. Have several things on the go at once. 
Basting a quilt takes a long time, and requires that at least the more mobile child be in bed (as "jumping" on the layers, or using them as frog blankets, is not generally recommended). Therefore, it's helpful to have smaller, quicker activities to do at times when a few hours and the entire living-room floor are not available. Like a song sung in a round, whenever something nears the end, something new begins.

6. Remember that no amount of time is too little.
Ten minutes is enough to sew seams. Five minutes is enough to cut. Sixty seconds is enough to pin something. Smaller amounts of time add up, and by getting the little jobs out of the way, when you do find a lovely big hour-long chunk of time, you won't need to waste time trimming corners!

when in doubt, start something new

This month, I'm trying to break the Guinness World Record for the most things on the go at once. (Which is a glass-half-full way of saying that I can't manage to keep my mind in one place long enough to finish anything).

Here's a sampling of the in-progress things that trip me up on a daily basis:

A rainbow of zips, ready for numerous open-wide pouches. Quilts in planning, in my favourite new gridded journal. A quilt on a tray, ready for chain-piecing. Quilt tops, stacking up, waiting for that once-upon-a-time day when I'll actually begin to enjoy basting them. And binding, binding, binding, in every colour.

life, squared

I am a square, and you are a square, sewn together by red thread. 

Sometimes we forget that we only need to fit together along one side. One square cannot complete all the sides of another. It's geometrically impossible, without enveloping the other. We don't need to be the same colour or the same pattern; we can be total opposites and that's okay, too. We're just two squares, in the end, and we alone do not make the design. 

This morning is a square and the words you said yesterday at breakfast are a square and what happens tomorrow afternoon will be a square, and all we have to do is run our fingers over them and appreciate that they are here, no matter whether we think they fit. They are sewn to us. We are sewn to them. We are sewn to each other and to the people we love and to people who don't know us and to the people next door who climb their trees and throw pinecones over the fence at us. We cannot unpick our seams. Nor should we try.

inspiration: colour vs. pattern

What inspires you? Is it shape and design that you love? Or are you drawn to that unexpected touch of colour, that perfect palette that gets your creative cogs turning?

Of course, the things that inspire us most usually have both elements -- an interesting design in colours we love. But I've found that I often miss out on sources of inspiration, simply because I can't see past the colours used. And so, I'm trying to train my brain to accept inspiration in both forms. Here are a few examples of patterns that appeal to me in spite of their colours.



These sandwiches combinations inspire me to try mixing half-square triangles of different patterns, or even different textures. (Corduroy with cotton? Denim?)

I'd love to have a go at a solid quilt, with star sashing -- perhaps all in black and white.



This modern sampler is beautiful, but I might ordinarily skip over it simply because of my awful bias against anything that uses the colour green!



And this little town can easily be adapted to any color scheme and style (though I might keep the pink and black...)

On the other hand, for a little colour inspiration, have a look at some of the colour mosaics over at Stitched in Colour. And if you happen to like a certain Red Red collection, feel free to cast your vote!

(images sources: 1, 2, 3, 4)

you are sew loved

"Feeding the people I love is a hands-on way of loving them. When you nourish and sustain someone, essentially, you're saying that you want them to thrive, to be happy and healthy and able to live well."

Author Shauna Niequist writes about her love of food, and how she has found that cooking for others is a tangible way of loving them. And though I don't often feel that way about food, that's exactly what sewing means to me. Sewing for the people I love is a hands-on way of loving them -- of keeping them warm and comforted, and perhaps brightening their day with a bit of colour. Emotion often stays concealed in the remote world of the heart and mind, but we can bring it out into the physical realm of the senses. Love is a warm bowl of minestone soup on a cold day. Love is a soft blanket to wrap around your shoulders when you wake before dawn. It's hands-on, it's communicated.

This quilt is a bit of tangible love for Art and Lylabeth -- a couple we met a week after we moved to Texas and were feeling very distant in that new-start, new-place sort of way. They showed us love with homemade cinnamon lemonade. Love was a physical space around the dining table, or room on the big leather sofa. Love was well-thumbed pages in borrowed books.

Next week, then, this quilt goes up for auction at the Salvation Army Banquet in honour of Art. You can find more details on the event here.

in progress: colour string theory

An upcoming project required me to spend yesterday evening cutting several hundred 5" squares, in (almost) every colour of the rainbow. And left over, at the end of each strip, these odd little scraps, very thin and all 5" long. Ordinarily, they'd all be swept into the bin, but at the moment I'm on a bit of a mission at to find a use for every last inch of fabric.

And so, rather than join the hoards of homeless scraps, these skinny little strings got pinned, in colour order.

Once they were pieced into groups of six, though, I laid them out and the neatly ordered spectrum was rather than less inspiring. I tried a few arrangements, and settled on simply skipping over the yellow section.

In true string-fever fashion, this little mini-quilt is stuffed with a dozen strips of batting, cut off the edges of larger quilts over the past few months. And now for some totally over-the-top quilting to hold it all together...