Calling myself a quilter used to be a bit like calling myself a runner; I felt fraudulent. I mean, how many quilts do you have to make to be A Quilter? I started piecing fabric together as a kid, having learned to sew from my mother. She made some elaborate quilts with finer stitching than I was capable of. I'm lucky to have her cathedral window quilt, which at various times hangs in my bedroom. My first try to make a quilt was a patchwork of just blocks, which I actually made into a long maxi skirt instead. Don't judge me; it was the early 70's! Then in college I decided to try and make my first landscape quilt. It was going to be a simple design of trees and because I was a frugal college kid, I decided to use sheets as the fabric. Well, it was quite awful and I abandoned it in fairly short order. I still use the base in the fall for moving leaves to the back yard. Pretty fitting actually, don't you think?
I labored under the notion that quilts had to be pieced by hand until I got to know my boss' wife -- A Real Quilter. She 'gave me permission' to piece with a sewing machine and that's when my world opened up -- as demonstrated by quilts actually being completed! The red log cabin quilt in the photo is my first finished bed-size quilt. It's a bit 'ugly' by the standards of "real" quilters. The strips are enormously wide and the white fabric is crappy muslin. Some of it was done with hand stitching and the rest by machine. It's not perfectly square. And yet, I kinda love this quilt. It represents my 'freedom" in a way.
The other photo is the last quilt I made. I've come a long way. It's an original design and it was a gift for my brother and his wife as they moved to a beautiful Vermont home. I have my next quilt in mind -- another landscape, probably a river scene. Probably for me, maybe for my Watershed Association as a fund-raiser. The idea has not met with energy just yet.