Quilt in the Works

Hallo, Sunday afternoon.

If any are still popping in based on my rec.crafts.textiles.quilting call-for-help - thank you and stay tuned... I've taken some folks advice and gotten down to it. I have removed my "in progress" snaps, just because they were, well, in progress, and I don't want the Mommy and Daddy of the baby-to-be having their surprise ruined, just in case they stumbled on my blog, which I don't think they know about, but still. I will pop up a final pic when I have it.

There is something both wholesomely productive and very zen about the production of a quilt. I'm slow, and not in any danger of ranking with the $10,000 per commission art quilters I do admire, but it is a real accomplishment to hand-craft something meaningful in this way. I use a machine, but the quilting gets done at its own pace. And the time is mine, gratefully claimed away from the outside world and the noise of the everyday. It clears the mind, just to focus on thread and fabric and where the next stitch should go.

It is also my quiet way of a rally against the Wal-mart mentality of mass consumerism, for cheap cheap cheap. True, I quilt right now for little ones who won't yet understand the difference between a handmade and unique quilt and the mass-printed Spongebob bedsheets they'd rather get for their birthday party. I hope that in time the quiet durability of a home-made quilt will outlast the latest TV marketing fad, and prompt them to see and hear the story of a quilt, and to learn to treasure the shabby finery of the handcrafted over the mass-market sameness of sweatshop imports. I can't make a quilt worth my time, ever. It is my meditation and prayer to put in those hours, time I will never get back, but I'm grateful to have the luxury of doing so. The only payback I might get is know someday that a child is dragging around the worn scraps of a much-loved blankey they've never been without. And that would be just fine.

Back to it. Before enlightenment, stitch fabric, trim thread. After enlightenment, stitch fabric, trim thread.