dsb38327

These life stories are all so heart warming to me. I watched my Mother sew all my life and didn't appreciate the skill that was involved in the things she made us or how important it was to her that we valued the things she made for us. I also didn't understand the passion.
I understand all those things now. My daughter can't sew on a button and her daughter is facinated when I sew.
I love the quiltingboard!

grammypatty7

When I was 15, my brother and his wife took my sister and me on a trip with them from IL to KY to visit her aging parents. We walked into this huge 2-1/2 story house with large rooms but very little furniture. The only rooms I can remember is the attic room where we slept, the kitchen where we ate AND the large room where the only items were 4 stright back chairs and the largest and first quilting frame with quilt that I'd ever seen. This tiny little lady had hand pieced this quilt from old clothing (Mother of 11 children and several grandchildren by that time). The quilt was beautiful! My sister and I weren't allowed to even touch it but we could sit and keep my sister in law, her sister, and Mother company while they hand quilted and visited. I vowed at that time, that one day I would be a quilter and what an experience it has been getting there but one I wouldn't trade for anything.

My mother made all of my sister's and my clothing and I would sit by her at her treadle sewing machine and watch. One summer they bought a set of child craft books and one of the volumes had craft ideas for children including how to make a doll from socks and doll clothing from scraps. Mom was working nights so would sleep during the day and in the afternoons, I would go in and use her sewing machine and follow the directions in my child craft book. They were pretty good sports when I cut up a pair of Dad's work socks without permission to make a sock doll. I do remember dressing it but have no clue what I used but I do remember walking to the Rexall drug store to buy cotton to stuff the doll with - didn't know there was a difference between first aid cotton and sewing cotton but I learned a few things with that first experience - specifically ask permission first. After that I used my allowance money earned by doing chores to buy supplies to make my dollies. Later in 7th grade, we had Home Ec and actually learned how to sew on an electric sewing machine. When I got into high school Home Ec, the teached phoned my parents and encouraged them to find a way to buy an electric sewing machine as I was showing talent and would do much better if I had an electric to use at home. Mom was terrified of that sewing machine but I believe it was a Kenmore and I enjoyed using it and so did she. Her sewing really improved a lot with that nice new sewing machine.

I didn't begin quilting until the first year of our marriage when I began the 38 year quilt which is my avatar and you can find out more about it by clicking on my user name, bookmarks, and then Patty's 38 year quilt. It is a story in itself.

craftybear

wow, lots of cool stories, this is an awesome thread, thanks

cjomomma

Ok here I go let't see if I can get my story straight or as much of it as I can right now. When I started this thread I wasn't sure if I wanted to tell the whole story. Mostly because it is kind of long. I will have to do it in sections. Thats if you all don't mind.

I like a lot of others grew up around grandmothers that quilted. I spent a lot of time playing under a quilting frame. I loved my grandmothers old treadle I would sit and play with that thing for hours. Mostly trying to see how fast I could get it to go. But no one ever said to me here you try sewing, so I thought it was just an adult thing. I was taught not to be a pest to adults when they are busy so I did my best to stay out of the way.
As a teenager I tried to learn to crochet, that lasted all of 5 min. I thought it was neat to see someone do it but I didn't like it myself. I still have the thing I tried to crochet. I have always liked to do some kind of arts and crafts and did that for years.
It wasn't until my DH's first nephew was born that I decided to make a quilt. I didn't make quilts for my chidren until they were older. But I made this jean quilt, washed it and it fell apart. Boy was I mad. So I went and got a bunch of baby patches and put them all over that quilt. I can't say how many I used cause I was embarrassed. Didn't have time to fix it cause they down from Seattle visiting in Ca. That little boy loved the patches. He was 6 months at the time and he would sit there and look and touch the patches. So I was very happy with my mistake.
I din't try making another quilt for a few years because of how that first one fell apart.

I wish I could sit and put all of this down at once but life is calling. I will try to finish it later today.
Carrie

cjomomma

Let me try this again.

After we moved to kentucky and we were broke.(we left a good life in Ca.) I knew it was gonna be a cold winter. I didn't want to pay the price at the store for some new blankets or quilts, basically cause I didn't have the money. So I made 3 jean quilts that kept us warm, they were the best thing I had ever made. Oh and they didn't fall apart when washed, YEAH!!! I made two more for family then stopped. Then 3 years ago I got pregnant. I was 39 and scared to death. I didn't know what we were gonna do cause we couldn't hardly afford the 2 kids we already have and to have a baby, I really thought God was playing a cruel joke on me. I worried my self right into having anxiety and then finally panic attacks almost everyday. Dr. gave me meds to take when they happened. But when I couldn't sleep I would get on the internet and that is how I found this board and read it for a few years before becoming a member. This board is what inspired to start quilting again. Seeing all the beautiful quilts, I wanted to make them all. So here I am 3 and a half years later and little man is my world. Spoiled oh yes. I went thru h--l to bring him into this world but at the same time it brought me to all you wonderful quilters. And now I am Happily qiulting and enjoying my family especially after having checked out for about 4 to 5 months of my life and theirs. Now my DM is getting in to quilting she has a bigger stash than I do and I been collecting longer than she has. LOL. She also worked at WM in the fabrics so she would buy and share it with me. I feel extremely lucky.

Thank you all for sharing your life stories. And yes I have read all of them word for word. Tho mine is not that intersting I figured that I started the topic so I might as well tell my whole story too.

dsb38327

Carrie, you seem to be a person with lots of insight. To know we would all want to tell at least part of our story. I am sure most of us condensed ours because our story spans so many years we don't have it all in the top of our mind. I had worried that I was a hoarder because I couldn't throw away a scrap of material yet it seemed like I wasn't sewing it often. Now I know it is a passion and not hoarding. I enjoyed your story. Thank-you for sharing with us. God provides a way.

cjomomma

You all have a way of bringing tears to my eyes. It has been along time sense I have been this emotional. I have been loving every story.
Thank you Dorothy, I have a very busy mind, I do a lot of thinking. Plus I am a bit nosy maybe:). I have always loved to hear peoples life stories it is almost a passion of mine. by the way if it wasn't for God I wouldn't be here and neither would little man.

grammypatty7

I'm so glad you asked us to share our stories as there are as many stories about our quilting as there are members and all very different. One thing I've learned along the way though is that unless you plan to enter your quilt into a juried show (where they are judged according to specific criteria) there are NO rules other than what you want them to be. Follow your heart with quilting and follow your instincts. The main thing is that the quilting bring you joy and peace. Sure, there will be frustrations such as I ran into machine quilting on a border. All was going along wonderfully, ran out of thread in my spool, changed it and a few stitches later my bobbin had a major hissy fit that resulted in my having to cut the bobbin mess to release the quilt; had to tear down the bobbin area and clean up the machine and of course rethread everything and worst of - rip out my line of fancy stitching on the border. Oh well. Can't complain as such experiences are very rare for me but they do happen to all of us at sometime. I took a few hour break and when I was ready, went back and tended to all of the above and finished quilting that side of the border today. Tomorrow I'll be putting on the top border and quiting it - I do quilt as you go in panels using a variation of Marti Michell's "Machine Quilting in Sections book". I first connected with her technique years (forever ago) when she was written up a few times in Woman's Day Magazine. After reading her article, I knew beyond a doubt I could manage this quilting thing without a frame or a hoop. I'm a hand quilter by choice but since joining a quilt chapter decided I can speed things up a bit by doing machine piecing, some machine quilting and enhance the detail quilting by still doing it by hand - so far I haven't learned how to do free motion quilting but one of these days will tackle it again and see how it goes but not yet. Thank you for asking this questions as we've all enjoyed reading about one another and where we got our start. In KY, you are in a quilting heaven so hopefully you have a choice to get out and see some of the quilts that are made in your wonderful state.

lazyquilter

Way back, maybe 20 years ago, I worked with the neatest and just bestest all around friend someone could have. And she was a very excellent quilter and she gave lessions at two separate fabric shops. So I decided that I would like to try. At that time, no strips, no templates other then hand made and no rotaries, just dress siscccrs. So she decided to teach me how to make a "samplier" quilt using the same techniques that she used in her beginners classes. At lunch time we would spread out on the office floor as the president of the company would step over us to get to the xerox machine. Well I was just so hyped on making a for real quilt that I knew that if you needed 9 blocks for a smaller quilt, can you imagine what more would do. At that time I was taught to pin, pin and pin and make sure your seams were touching nicely. Well, we were into a four day weekend as I worked for a company that most people would kill for. so I had four days to put together my samplier quilt. By the time I got all these rows of blocks sewn together, my quilt sizee was bigger then a king size bed. and as I carried this massive pile of fabric in, smiling with great pride.. I thought Sharon, bless her heart, would fall off her chair. And try as she could, keeping a straight face was not something that could be accomplished at this point. As I held it up for all to see, there was not one row that even closely matched the row beneath it, some were off by at least an inch or more, but I made the top. Sharon knew that having me to attempt to put a border on it by myself was going to be next to impossible so she took it home with her. There and she and her hubby Doug, laughing like fools as I found out later, managed to cut a border and pinned it for me as I wanted to sew it. And finish it. And sure enough, when I got it back I was the one who stitched the borders and then I had to figure out how to patch the batting, it was ugly, but I stitched up at 5 pieces of batting for the center of this quilt and then I must have had to use 8 yards of fabric for the backing, cut to fit, which was hysterical, but to me, I was making the quilt from hell and I was just full of myself. We decided to just stitch and do the inside out thing and then close up the small opening. At that point there was no sitich in the ditch, the best we could do was to tie every so many spots. Finally, after a well drawn out battle of wits, I had completed my quilt. It was to long on one side, to off on the other and not one seam matched anywhere on this samplier quilt. And I was so pleased to be able to give my daughter and her husband to be my very first quilt. I found out months later that every single night, day or inbetween, they were still finding pins that were buried in various parts of this quilt on the inside. My son inlaw would have to use wire cutters to try to snip the pins so they could get them out. For one full year straight pins were still being pulled out of my work of excellence. My two grand daughters, their father had died tragically young and this was their step dad.. carried this killer quilt on sleep overs and sleep ins. And to this day, Shawn and Big Randy still have this quilt, The batting has shifted badly, some seams had to be re-stitiched and it was bare in some spots. But I can say with all the joy in the world, I made my first quilt.... fortunately, even with the pins left in the quilt there were no law suits for pin injuries at any time.

From that day on, I rarely use green unless it's something I need use everyday. My beloved Sharon's battle with breast cancer for 5 years, and as with her mother, after numerious treatments and surgeries, Sharon died 3 years after my first brain surgery. I can remember when she was allowed out of islation in the hospital for the first time, I made her three survivors hats. God was watching over me as all three hats fit her perfectly and they did give her the comfort she deserved at this point. And in my heart, I know she still laughs when she remembers teaching me how to make my very first quilt.

cjomomma

That was a beautiful story thanks for sharing it. Carrie