QUILTING, ITS OWN REWARD

 Yesterday, I talked about one very special quilt that hangs each year at the Independence Hall Quilt Faire, the original Bi-centennial quilt.  With more than 100 quilts never before displayed here, I had much to choose from for today's blog.  Themes change from year to year. Themes develop from popular pattern makers, or new methods, or fabrics that follow pop culture. Quilters present it all. Some quilts use one huge central design with a border to great effect, like the bird above and the star, bear paws and flowers below.

Among the themes I've noticed over the years come teddy bears, cats, shoes, trees, and multiple explosions of color and  abstract placement of blocks. Some so complicated they have to be engineered on a computer or placed on a giant, room sized quilt board to make sense of the pattern. It can involve cutting one or two fabrics up, and sewing them back together again. I didn't see much of that this year, maybe the economy has affected quilting. After all, quilting evolved from hard scrabble times, when people threw nothing out. Every little scrap of fabric was saved and sewed together to make a usable blanket.

I call them rescue quilts. Here this woman lovingly quilts an old quilt top that someone had tossed. Small blocks of every color, pattern and hue. Simple and direct. Scrap quilts are still very popular at the faires I've attended, including this one.

 Home and family are always subjects for quilts. I didn't see many baby quilts at this year's faire, but a new take on homes was this habitat quilt with housing from many countries. A thatched roof...

 Houseboats...

 City dwellers apartments. Different.

Bird houses have been all the rage in the last few years.

 Families love to celebrate their loved ones in a quilt as in this 50th anniversary quilt.

 Applique is considered a difficult quilt, small pieces, laboriously hand folded narrow edges. Old time appliques were subtle, and beautiful. New methods make applique easier, and new appliques are much more brightly colored with fabrics of great diversity as well.

 Below is the whole affect, though not every block shows in the photo.

 Pinwheels are an old time pattern. They make a beautiful quilt. The triangles were common scraps when making clothing and women learned to make quilts using pointed scraps.

 The faire has many categories, such as wearable quilted pieces, wall hangings, dolls and other needlework. Women who sew, love it all.

 This woman's pants weren't on display but it is common to find quilters at the faire wearing their own handwork.

This quilter provided a unique way to display buttons she liked.

 The category for dolls brought this American Gothic entry.

This little wall hanging reminds me of Amish country, with quilts on the line. Fun!

 And this abstract wall hanging is a different form of needlework. Beautiful.
For a look at my quilt photos click on the following link:
http://picasaweb.google.com/1579penn/102410Quilts#

THIRTY THREE YEARS AND COUNTING

There are big scary monsters under the bed,
And every night they must be fed,
They love to eat fabric, its their favorite food,
It puts them in the very best mood,
So, the lesson is clear, consider your plight,
Keep buying more fabric, or be dinner tonight.

There is a saying among quilters that She Who Dies With The Most Fabric Wins. It captures the addictive nature of quilting. Your mind swirls with patterns you want to see come alive in a particular color or form. Every piece of fabric is already a work of art. Then mix it with other scraps of fabric in deliberate swirls, or bars, or stars or squares, and we all become a bit like Jackson Pollock. But quilting is so much more than artistic expression and a delightful hobby.

The Independence Hall Quilters (whose fair I attended yesterday) organized in 1976 with a push from the National and State Bicentennial Committees encouraging local communities to put together events reminiscent of Colonial times. This exceptional group has held a quilt show every year since then. They average 100 quilts per show, and no quilt can be displayed twice. Doing the numbers, that's about 3300 original quilts.


This is a close up of an old quilt. Heritage quilt entries are encouraged. Its dainty, pastel and feminine, when quilts were only made by women. Today many men engage in the craft more often called fabric art.

Quilts engage so many subjects, like the humor in the child's quilt above, reminiscent of the book Where The Wild Things Are; and the heart quilt above made of T-shirts awarded to people who give blood platelets. This quilt honors one man who donated over 500 pints of platelets at Stanford Oncology Center and others who have given 100 pints and so on. Amazing!
There were many beautiful quilts, but I'm crazy about chickens and this quilt caught my eye. Imagine my surprise when I read the label and it was made by a good friend and neighbor, Roxanne Borean.
I mentioned that quilting is addictive, but so many other adjectives come to mind when I relate to this group of quilters:
Skill, patience, friendship, charity, homely, warmth, practical, work, love, beauty, humor, neighbors, memories, talent and joy.
What more could you ask for in a hobby?

LETTUCE FESTIVAL AND LILLY QUILT FAIRE

Local festivals are charming and the Yuma Lettuce Festival promised to entertain and delight. A man encloses himself in a balloon and bounces all over the street. We somehow missed him but we did get to see the ladies modeling their hats and jewelry made of lettuce, brussel sprouts, onions and...well you get the idea. They really got into it and played to the crowd and it WAS charming. However, Murphys has so many street festivals that I attend (or not), that I realized half the fun is meeting and greeting half your neighbors and friends. Even, so, I would opt to do it again.
The local quilt faire was quite well done, as well. Our own guild in Calaveras County, the Independence Hall Quilters does a superb job and their workmanship is superior. (Of course, I'm biased.) But, hail to all quilters and lettuce queens. It was an excellent last day in Yuma.
Until Tomorrow
P.S.
Back in Murphys, Karen tells me they have had false spring. She says,
"We can't send it back, so we might as well enjoy it."
(Jim is jealous of our weather...Heh, heh, heh!)