Fleur - Paint by Numbers Inspired Quilt

Fluer

16” x 20”

A sweet mini inspired by that hummingbird paint by numbers. It is clear I am much better at quilts than paint by numbers!

In June of 2021 my kids bought me the paint by numbers for a new Morning Make activity. Each day I patiently worked my way through the numbers. It was the right kind of meditative play for me for Morning Make, but when I finished halfway through the month I declined the offer to start a new one. Just not my thing. Then a friend suggested I make a quilt inspired by the painting.

Once finished, it, like many other quilt tops of mine, sat. And sat. A few weeks ago I was in the mood to play with some free motion quilting. Having a mini on hand was fortuitous. It’s an easy baste and in 20 minutes I was stitching. Once I completed the leaves to the flowers (in a perfect olive green from Aurifil) I decided the hand stitch in the centers of the flowers and leave the rest unquilted. Simple, yet graphic.

So now they are both done. Will they hang together? Probably not. For one, I did a pretty crap job on the painting. And two, we have a no quilts on the wall rule. That’s okay, I’ll just bring her out every now and then when I need a little pick me up.

Quilters Stand for Ukraine - Resources

Like always, I and many other quilters are using their fabric to process emotions. We are in scary, depressing times right now with the Russian attack on Ukraine. Like many others I can only watch in fear and dismay. Like many other Ukrainian Canadians I can only help from the sidelines.

Whether it is donations from the sales of patterns, exclusive and free patterns, shopping on Etsy for downloads from Ukrainian creators, or making ourselves, there are many projects and initiatives within the craft community for showing and sharing support for our Ukrainian brothers and sisters. Here is a list of what I know of so far. (Feel free to email me at cheryl@cherylarkison.com if you know of others and I will update the list.)

Peace paper pieced block by Happy Sew Lucky (free download)

Dove Mini Quilt Pattern by Tamara Kate Designs (all sale proceeds to Ukraine relief orgs via Canadian Red Cross)

Quilters Stand for Ukrainian quilt block by Pat Sloan (donate and free download)

Sunflower block by Quiet Play (free download with donation request)

Rise of Freedom by Sashas Quilt (Paper pieced pattern download from a Ukrainian quilter)

My own sunflowers above are a version of the simple improv tutorial provided by Anne Larsen. My plan is to make a field of sunflowers. One of our employees is from Kharkiv herself and only today we learned that her mother and in-laws are finally safe in Germany. They will be coming to Canada as soon as they can and it might be nice to cover them with a small taste of home when they arrive. Sometimes you can’t help every person so you pick someone you can directly impact and do the work. We are doing what we can to support our employee and her family because we can see this direct impact. Being a quilter, you know there will be a quilt or two.

Rest

Truth be told, I’m not very good at rest. I want to be, I try to be, but it’s hard. I’ve come to realize that this is because I would generally consider rest as sitting on my butt and doing nothing. Stop me if this sounds familiar though, you can’t sit and do nothing until everything is done. Everything is never done, right? Which means you never rest.

We thus need a new definition of rest.

At one time in life (when I was younger) I was a competitive athlete. Back then rest meant two things. One, just like above, rest was simply not doing the training. Two, within a workout there was active rest. So not the hard training pieces, but the easy strokes in between the hard sets. As a professional quilter I see the benefit of the latter. As a parent I realize the former is impossible. So that has led to me understanding that I need two unique forms of rest.

Active Rest

When you are working on deadlines and contracts quilting can feel like a chore, let alone actual work for some. Quite often the quilting becomes hard and full of drudgery. What once gave us joy and energy drags us down. It’s one thing to be pushing to meet a deadline like a wedding or show entry. This is why I am a big fan of Active Rest.

This is about, in many respects, mindless sewing and play. It’s the sewing that doesn’t challenge you or push your creativity. It might be creative action though. So maybe sewing snippets of fabrics in pairs, making HSTs, aligning strips, binding a quilt, stippling a quilt. The kind of sewing that allows you to catch your breath after a hard run. That’s why it is called Active Rest. You are still doing something but giving yourself the opportunity to slow down, gather thoughts, and be mindless for a little while. Because creativity begets creativity your juices will eventually start flowing again and you will be ready for the next challenge.

Escape to Rest

While running away to the beach or the mountains is many, many people’s idea of escape (myself included) we can’t do it that often. That’s why we need to find daily or weekly moments of escape. For me, this often includes long walks in the forests not far from home, a ski trip for the day, or maybe camping in the summer. It might be a hot bath, curling up with a great book, or binging a new show. My best advice when on a physical escape like this is to lean in to it. So no stitching while watching TV, no podcasts on your walk, leaving the sewing at home on a trip out of town. Let escape truly be a mental break.

Don’t want to give up your creative pursuits, even for a moment? Then switch it up! Escape to Rest also means exploring other creative interests. Trying crochet, taking a watercolour class, learning embroidery, even reading a fashion magazine. Your muscles and brain are still working, but in a different way. This alternate firing of brain cells gives your quilting brain a rest, your conscious mind an escape, but you are still pursuing creativity. It can be both relaxing and liberating.

In truth, this is what Morning Make has been for me over the last two years, on the months I am not sewing, that is. Trying weaving and embroidery and painting and poetry is an Escape to Rest for my creative brain.

The last few years have been rough for everyone. Indeed, rough is an understatement. While there were long periods of time where we were home, languishing, we weren’t still resting. Doomscrolling, cleaning, stressing, eating, teaching our kids, working on the dining room table - all of it added up to HARD WORK. Watching Tiger King at the end of the day just didn’t quite give us our energy back.

Resting is not easy.. I don’t want to be roped in to the mess of toxic positivity either when I say rest is important. Rest is a choice. It’s taken me a long, long time to see that and thus make it priority. I thought not having to drive my kids all evening was going to be the rest I needed. Nope, not even close. I puttered and wandered and zoned out but I did not rest. Since choosing to make rest an important part of my life I can feel myself catch my breath a little quicker, like I am getting in shape. The more I rest the better I feel when I am doing the hard stuff.

Full confession: I just spent the weekend in the mountains with my husband, just my husband. I brought crafty things to do and read but, in the end, read a thriller, took 5 baths in 48 hours, ate room service, and walked in a snowy forest. Now that’s an Escape to Rest! Then I came home ready to sew!

Mame - The Exclamation Point Quilt

Mame

77” x 72”

Like her namesake, Mame is known for speaking her mind and living wildly. She brings her best energy to everything, even when things are awful. She speaks what she wants, even if the consequences are great. People love her, even when it is hard. People love her, but don’t always want to admit it. At home with Princes and Sailors, Mame is fierce with love and other emotions Loving Mama doesn’t always mean less pain in your life, but definitely a lot more fun.

Confusion, solidarity, mourning, exhaustion, confinement, noise, and togetherness.

When the Covid Pandemic first started we all ran through the gamut of emotions. With or without children, whether you could work from home or not, whether you stayed employed or housed, whether you lost loved ones to illness or friendships to principles, no one is getting through the pandemic unscathed. Then there are all the emotions attached to it. At the beginning I admit to relishing the home time with my family; mostly, the break from rushing from one thing to the next. Soon, it wasn’t easy at all and I became annoyed with grocery shopping, a lack of entertainment, and home schooling. I slept more and still felt tired. More than once I held my head in my hands and cried.

Anger, frustration, laughter, annoyance, stress, despondency, grief, and fear.

I screamed a lot too. Mostly into the ether, but not always. The entire household all had our moments. To channel it all I started making blocks. I wanted to say all the words of anger, call our politicians and Covidiots all the names, give space for my kids to do the same. They say that swearing reduces the impact of pain, but I wonder what they would say about sewing swears? Because I didn’t want to sew all the words into blocks I sewed what would come at the end of each word - the Exclamation Point!

(And yes, I screamed for real when I took the above picture.)

Then I gave myself the freedom to quilt all those words right into the quilt. Using cursive to quilt such strong words felt amazing! It was really, really therapeutic. The overall quilting pattern reflects the first three waves of the pandemic as felt here in Alberta. In between those lines I added the best words, insults, and expressions to make a sailor blush. By the time I finished quilting it we were cresting the 4th wave so the final stitches have some very, very powerful things to say.

While I was making the quilt a lot of people suggested I make some red exclamation points. A strong colour for strong emotions. I wanted to stick to the story I was telling - ink on paper - but knew red would make an appearance one way or another. So I added a big exclamation point on the back, set in an alphabet print of my own. Oh yeah, and a bonus exclamation point in fabric sent to me by Brenda Suderman, a writer who published a story about this project.

Red also found its home in the binding. You know I love a contrast binding! This came from fabric I dyed with kids. You know how it was, sourdough and tie dye as pandemic activities.

There isn’t a quilter out there who doesn’t know the therapeutic power of quilting. Sometimes it is just about spending the time playing or slowing down or even going through the motions to calm our nerves. And sometimes it is about processing our emotions through what we are making, quite literally. This expressive form of quilting is powerful. For me, this very personal project certainly helped me get through these past 20 months. It gave me a focus for my feelings, an outlet for the pent up energy, and. calming for being able to create something cool out of such stress.

Remember, if you want to make your own Exclamation Point blocks there is a free tutorial available.