Sanctuary Sewing With Kids

How many of you seeing your sewing/quilting as your sanctuary? The one place you can go, especially in these times, where you get personal space and peace?

Yup, me too.

That’s why it is a personal conflict when the kids want to sew too. On one hand, total pride and excitement that they want to take up the craft and make their own art. Joy that they feel their creative juices flowing and want to be just like Mama. On the other hand, that’s my space, my thing, my break. Obviously, I am more excited than annoyed. Way more excited.

So when my son, my newly minted 8 year old, asked if he could learn to sew All. By. Himself. I jumped at the chance to teach him the machine. Prior to this he’s sat on my lap or played with the fabric, maybe a little hand stitching. He definitely has an eye for design. We had a lesson on the machine parts and what they do, on safety, and how to sew a straight line. He is a very cool kid who absorbs all lessons like a sponge so he took to it right away. Even made up his own mnemonic songs to remember steps. And in less than a day he had a 20” patchwork block. It was going to be a pillow, but as soon as he was done he asked to make a quilt. And another 24 hours later he had a second block.

And a pincushion.

The girls have been sewing during isolation too. Scrunchies and yo-yos. Moments of quiet creativity to calm the spirit. So many yo-yos…

Then someone else decided she wanted to turn her hand stitched nine patches into machine stitched, because one can’t be outdone by their little brother after all! I only have two machines! (Only?!) so I get booted off for their sewing. So much for my sanctuary. But this is so, so much better.

5 Minute Improv - Exclamation Point from Quilters' Playcation

Take a Quilters' Playcation. No demands, no requirements, just sewing. Improv quilting at its most fun! part of a series of 5 minute improv - make one block ...

Well, what can I say? These are strange, surreal times. Has anyone really processed it all yet? Can we even?

At least we can make! I’m sure we’ve all seen a meme or a joke about how quilters have always been prepared for self isolation and staying home. Of course, for those of us with kids at home or having to figure out work in all of this that presents a challenge for sure. Thinking about all the words we want to say, all the emotions we are feeling, and knowing that making helps our mental health SO MUCH I designed a simple improv block. And I filmed a tutorial to share.

Exclamation Point is the first in a series of videos I am calling 5 Minute Improv. Grab some scraps and you can make a block in 5 minutes. Sneak in the sewing when you can or make a mountain of blocks to help you process all the feelings. They are part of a bigger venture called Quilters’ Playcation. More on that soon! For now, enjoy your making. At least we still have that.

Morning Make - February 2020

As the granddaughter of the quintessential Ukrainian Baba it might have been inevitable that I would embroider something at some point. I won’t lie, I’ve avoided, even resisted, embroidery over the years. That was Baba’s thing, not mine. When the girls played around with it I could support them, but stayed out of the way. Mostly, it just never appealed to me.

For February I decided to face it. A new stitch or motif every day for all 29 days. No commitment to finish a designed piece or fill a space. Just pure experimentation and play.

I did not account for really enjoying this.

To start, I fused a stabilizer (some random one in my drawer) to a piece of linen. I dug out my Baba’s stash of embroidery floss, colour sorted thanks to one of my daughters plus my stash of Valdani threads. I found a few videos on You Tube and a couple of books on my shelf to begin. Using basic stitches like back stitch, stem stitch, lazy daisy, and a running stitch I got the first few days in. Then I looked for more things to do. The more I looked, the more I wanted to try! There are a heck of a lot of embroidery stitches out there!!!

My one stipulation was that I only use one thread per day. A couple of times it was a variegated thread so it looks like more than that though. This limitation kept me from making intricate designs, both a good and a bad thing. Good because this was about learning stitches and experimenting. Also good because I only had my 20-30 minutes in the morning and more detailed work takes time. Bad because I would get really excited and start thinking about things I could do with the stitch and patterning if I could just add another colour or alternate stitches.

This is ultimately the point of these Morning Make exercises - to see what you can do with your limitations and open up your mind to creative possibilities!

I will confess, that part of the reason I wanted to do this was to see if I could find some potential quilting stitches. You see a lot more hand work beyond the perfect quilting stitches and cliche big stitch out there. Those are great, but could I do more than plus signs/Xs? Here is the back of the piece - what do you think?

Here are some of my favourite resources for technique or inspiration:

S is for Stitch by Kristyne Czepuryk
Handiworks You Tube Channel

@kim_broidery on Instagram

Now on to March! I’ve started the month with the flu so have chosen some relaxing Colour Meditations by Lisa Solomon via CreativeBug. They’ve been a lot of fun to share with my son, who is also sick.

Itty Bitty Improv Curves - A Quilt Top

No one prepares you for the emotions of making a quilt. The thrill of picking fabric. The boredom of cutting fabric. The thrill of sewing. The boredom of pressing. The thrill of finishing a top. It’s a roller coaster journey for sure. And this is not counting the therapy contained within the emotional journey. Quilting can often have me working through some stuff, processing and feeling the feels while making a quilt, to have the release at the end.

Sometimes, though, the opposite happens. The quilt making gives you all the thrills and makes you smile with each stitch, no matter the work. Then you finish and there is a let down. There was so much joy in making that when you finish you are sad. I want to keep going! Don’t make me stop.

Alas, I’ve run out of fabric.

I started this quilt with some scraps, a stack I grabbed for the initial class with the amazing Chawne Kimber at QuiltCon. Once I embraced the itty bitty curves I made in her class I eventually augmented the selection - more from the recesses of my stash and a trip to a local shop. I tried to match the colours of the vintage pieces (I think some of these purples came from my Baba’s house) and samples as best I could. With no real plan in mind other than to make blocks I made blocks until I more or less ran out of fabric.

Okay, there is a bit of fabric left, but not enough to make a random assortment of blocks. If I continued on I would have a big pink section somewhere. Yes, I could buy more, but I can’t replicate all the fabrics so, again, it would look less random. It pains me a little to not have this be a giant quilt, but so be it.

So with not enough fabric left to make it bigger I’ve stopped the sewing. It measures into a generous lap size (73’’ x 66’’). Considering the smallest blocks are finishing at 3/4’’ that amounts to a lot of piecing. Not once did that piecing feel like work or drudgery. It was addictive. Better than eating M&Ms, although the let down kind of feels like a sugar crash.

The whole quilt isn’t square and I’m not sure exactly how I will deal with that, but for now, let me wallow in it being done. And count the number of blocks. 1,2,3,4,…1000, 10001, 1002…

Chawne warned us about going small, that the high from it was glorious. That only means the low of finishing is that much so. That’s okay, I’m not done with itty bitty curves yet, even if this quilt top is finished.