Monday, October 07, 2013

On the changing of goals for a quilter

In the past few years I have kept more quilts than I have in my more than 30 years of quilt making.

My younger quilter friends are in that place in life where I used to be: that is, maintaining a long list of friends getting married & friends having babies -- and all *have* to be gifted with quilts. Not that these friends are demanding quilts, but we quilters feel they need quilts for these special occasions. There is little time for making quilts to keep!

Thirty years down the road, I still make the occasional wedding quilt (2nd marriage, marriage of a son or daughter) or baby quilt (mostly grandchildren now or just a block contributed to a group quilt). In between, there were the first communion & graduation quilts, quilts for a new job in a new city, new home. As an older quilter, I've made quilts for mile-stone birthdays (40, 50, 60) & retirement, comfort quilts for a serious illness & after a death, memory quilts made with a loved one's clothing. 

Quilts are there for all the Big Life Events. 

But as I said, I'm keeping more quilts now. My stack has gone from 1 or 2 to a big ol' pile -- more than we really need down here on the Gulf coast! Am I making more quilts or are the Big Life Events a less compressed in time as we get older? I'm not sure. And I really don't care that much about having lots of quilts (though I'm not ready to part with any of the ones here) -- most of all, I love making them. So I'm trying to balance making-to-keep with making-to-give-away. 



The 2nd stack of give-away quilts doesn't look like much since none of them are actually finished, but there's a dozen of them there, mostly lap quilts, some baby quilts & not in the photo are the ones in-progress & the few that are finished. I'm having such fun pulling out-of-date fabrics & making things with them. (One of my all-time favorite quilts, from back in the day, was made with fabrics given to me by a friend of Shug's; I didn't like any of the fabrics -- too ditsy & sweet -- but I really liked the quilt I made with them. It's a great challenge, making something you like with something you don't love or don't love anymore -- try it!) 

And using up my fabric oldies is making room for new fabric -- everyone wins!!!

4 comments:

CapitolaQuilter said...

I can see how this is a moving target. Be sure not give up the ones you aren't ready to and I do like the challenge of dusting off wips and finishing them with a fresh twist rather than the original plan, especially if I am making them for charity.

O'Quilts said...

Me too...I find that when a quilt is ready to be given away, I will know it. So I keep the stack on hand and love them until the time is right. It is a great feeling then, the perfect quilt for the perfect person.

Nifty Quilts said...

You have some beautiful stacks of quilts here! It's funny how life takes us into new and unexpected places.

Rachaeldaisy said...

I love the look of your stacks. I'm at the point where I need to give more away, I have quilts piling up everywhere!! I should make some stacks like yours.