Why do we do this?
09-28-2012, 06:48 AM
#41
Super Member
Join Date: Aug 2007
Location: Clay Springs AZ
Posts: 3,229
I spend way to much on quilting but it is what I love to do.
My family dosnt know what goes into quilting and my daughter keeps throwing some woman she knows who is an art quilter at me.
The stores carry slave labor quilts that are cheap to buy.
It is discouraging but it is what I want to do and the pleasure you get from it is priceless.
Reading is my other love and it is much cheaper. So between the two Im happy and satisfied.
Just bought two kits to try out so off to the sewing room.
My family dosnt know what goes into quilting and my daughter keeps throwing some woman she knows who is an art quilter at me.
The stores carry slave labor quilts that are cheap to buy.
It is discouraging but it is what I want to do and the pleasure you get from it is priceless.
Reading is my other love and it is much cheaper. So between the two Im happy and satisfied.
Just bought two kits to try out so off to the sewing room.
09-28-2012, 06:58 AM
#42
Member
Join Date: Sep 2012
Location: Illinois
Posts: 34
Here's a perspective from a brand new quilter.
I do it because I believe it's a dying art. There aren't many people that I know in real life who quilt. The women in my quilter's guild are all easily 20+ years older than I am (I'm in my early 30s). I started because I wanted a baby clothes quilt made from my daughter's infant clothes, but didn't find anyone that I really trusted (this was before I found my guild). So I decided to learn how to do it myself...and I found that I really, really enjoy doing it. And the best part? My 3 year old LOVES to help me quilt. She will hand me pins, or put pins in the "tomato". She loves going to the fabric store with me and picking out fabric. So for me, what started as me trying to do something I couldn't find anyone else to do turned into something that I LOVE to do...and something that my daughter LOVES to do with me. I'm hoping that her love of quilting continues as she gets older.
BTW...I still haven't gotten up the courage to cut up her clothes...
I do it because I believe it's a dying art. There aren't many people that I know in real life who quilt. The women in my quilter's guild are all easily 20+ years older than I am (I'm in my early 30s). I started because I wanted a baby clothes quilt made from my daughter's infant clothes, but didn't find anyone that I really trusted (this was before I found my guild). So I decided to learn how to do it myself...and I found that I really, really enjoy doing it. And the best part? My 3 year old LOVES to help me quilt. She will hand me pins, or put pins in the "tomato". She loves going to the fabric store with me and picking out fabric. So for me, what started as me trying to do something I couldn't find anyone else to do turned into something that I LOVE to do...and something that my daughter LOVES to do with me. I'm hoping that her love of quilting continues as she gets older.
BTW...I still haven't gotten up the courage to cut up her clothes...
09-28-2012, 07:14 AM
#43
Super Member
Join Date: Dec 2010
Location: Oregon
Posts: 1,904
I have no job. I'm too lazy to clean. I hate yard work. Day time television is awful. I can only kill an hour a day at the gym.
Seriously, I sew because it is fun. I make a quilt and throw it on the pile. If someone wants one, OK. If not, the pile isn't hurting anything.
Seriously, I sew because it is fun. I make a quilt and throw it on the pile. If someone wants one, OK. If not, the pile isn't hurting anything.
09-28-2012, 07:18 AM
#44
Super Member
Join Date: Mar 2012
Location: Southeast Georgia
Posts: 2,526
Well, there you go! All of the above, except for the hour at the gym! I sew, knit, paint, scrapbook, or whatever because I love it. I spent all afternoon yesterday cleaning a sewing machine. I enjoyed it! Most people would hate it, but it was my grandmother's machine, and as I took it apart, cleaned the pieces and put it back together, I felt that she was with me for a while! I suppose we really do have reasons for the things we do!
09-28-2012, 07:23 AM
#46
Super Member
Join Date: Apr 2012
Location: Texas
Posts: 2,369
It does keep me sane at times. Besides when I am finished I feel so accomplished.
But this past weekend this fellow I met for the first time was happy to find out I was a quilter and he asked me why quilts are no light weight now. My belief was because women that could not afford batting used what they could, one thing being old wool blankets. Especially when men came home from the service they brought these very scratchy wool blankets home. They were very warm but very scratchy, so women covered them and they became quilts. My mother did it with my father's blanket. I could be very wrong, but he was fairly sure that's what his mother did. They were also fairly inexpensive at the surplus store and often found at the second hand shops. So he wants one now because they pitched all the ones his mother had after she died. I told him to go buy the wool blanket and I would be able to do the rest.
Was I wrong asking him to buy the wool blanket first? i felt this was the best way to find out if he was really serious. There is a surplus store near him that he can go to to get the blankets. I just had a feeling in my gut that if I went to buy them they would be the wrong size or not heavy enough or something. This way if he really wants one, he will be able to see before its made how heavy it will be.
But this past weekend this fellow I met for the first time was happy to find out I was a quilter and he asked me why quilts are no light weight now. My belief was because women that could not afford batting used what they could, one thing being old wool blankets. Especially when men came home from the service they brought these very scratchy wool blankets home. They were very warm but very scratchy, so women covered them and they became quilts. My mother did it with my father's blanket. I could be very wrong, but he was fairly sure that's what his mother did. They were also fairly inexpensive at the surplus store and often found at the second hand shops. So he wants one now because they pitched all the ones his mother had after she died. I told him to go buy the wool blanket and I would be able to do the rest.
Was I wrong asking him to buy the wool blanket first? i felt this was the best way to find out if he was really serious. There is a surplus store near him that he can go to to get the blankets. I just had a feeling in my gut that if I went to buy them they would be the wrong size or not heavy enough or something. This way if he really wants one, he will be able to see before its made how heavy it will be.
09-28-2012, 07:50 AM
#48
Super Member
Join Date: Sep 2010
Location: Hoosick Falls, NY
Posts: 2,076
Why? Well it is something I always wanted to do. As a child it looked like magic to me. It keeps me sane too. I just love creating. For the most part it is fun, except the "unsewing" part. I love making them with someone specific in mind, and then I love trying out new patterns and qulit kits...
09-28-2012, 07:53 AM
#49
Super Member
Join Date: Jan 2009
Location: PA
Posts: 2,879
I'm always surprised when someone says they make quilts because they couldn't afford a ""store- bought" gift!! I'm making a quilt for a retirement gift that right now has about $500 worth of just supplies - hasn't even been quilted yet. Not only is that a lot of money, but I would never, never, never BUY a $500 retirement gift! I do this because I love it!
09-28-2012, 08:10 AM
#50
Super Member
Join Date: May 2010
Location: washington
Posts: 1,424
I believe that since the quilt was a gift, not sold and for a group, I think you could have had the original VW logo in there. Just don't sell it. Though I have been wrong once or twice in my life..smile....
Why do we do what we do? Why do we spend so much more money and time making something for someone, rather than going to the nearest retailer and plopping down $20 on a trinket instead?
I personally have two reasons:
1. My mother told me some horror stories of shopping the day after Thanksgiving, one of which involved a hurried shopper pushing a wheelchair-bound customer into a wall to get them out of their way, all in the name of obtaining the best sale items. I decided then and there that if a gift wasn't handmade by me, it wasn't getting given. There have been times when people got a bag of homemade chocolate chip cookies from me, but they were made with love. One Christmas morning, the cookies were even warm...and who doesn't like warm fresh chocolate chip cookies? I guarantee they won't end up in the Goodwill bin...
2. The second reason is that when I make something for someone, I put a lot of myself into it. I have a couple of quilt tops made and stored, things that I made to try a new pattern and now what do I do with it, that kind of stuff. But I don't have finished quilts "in stock" for a random person (does anyone else have Justin Case in their closet?). I like to personalize the item, and while I am making it, I think of things that will appeal to the recipient and incorporate them into the quilt. For example, I recently made a quilt for a Volkswagen Club, the members of which are mostly classic Beetle owners. I quilted a likeness of the VW logo in the center (not identical tho - no copyright issues), along with a script of Ferdinand Porsche, the man who engineered the Beetle. Also included was 1945 (the year it was first marketed), "flower power", the words "rear mounted" and "air cooled" which pertain to the Beetle's rear mounted engine - many fun facts were FMQ'd as the quilting into the quilt. It was interesting and fun to do, and I know the ultimate recipient (the quilt will be raffled off this weekend) will love it. (I titled the quilt "One Day in Stuttgart" because that's where the Beetle was engineered, by the way - a little fun fact for next time you want to impress your friends with useless trivia.) That's one reason I do things like this.
I guess the most important reason though, is that when you do a job for financial reimbursement (and there's nothing wrong with that, we've all enjoyed paying gigs!), the money flows through your hands too quickly, but when you give someone something that contains your blood, sweat, tears, and (most importantly) your love, the look on their face when they first see it will be something you can revisit for years...long after that money is gone.
It must be that time of the month or something, I'm normally not this mushy!
So....why do YOU do what you do?
I personally have two reasons:
1. My mother told me some horror stories of shopping the day after Thanksgiving, one of which involved a hurried shopper pushing a wheelchair-bound customer into a wall to get them out of their way, all in the name of obtaining the best sale items. I decided then and there that if a gift wasn't handmade by me, it wasn't getting given. There have been times when people got a bag of homemade chocolate chip cookies from me, but they were made with love. One Christmas morning, the cookies were even warm...and who doesn't like warm fresh chocolate chip cookies? I guarantee they won't end up in the Goodwill bin...
2. The second reason is that when I make something for someone, I put a lot of myself into it. I have a couple of quilt tops made and stored, things that I made to try a new pattern and now what do I do with it, that kind of stuff. But I don't have finished quilts "in stock" for a random person (does anyone else have Justin Case in their closet?). I like to personalize the item, and while I am making it, I think of things that will appeal to the recipient and incorporate them into the quilt. For example, I recently made a quilt for a Volkswagen Club, the members of which are mostly classic Beetle owners. I quilted a likeness of the VW logo in the center (not identical tho - no copyright issues), along with a script of Ferdinand Porsche, the man who engineered the Beetle. Also included was 1945 (the year it was first marketed), "flower power", the words "rear mounted" and "air cooled" which pertain to the Beetle's rear mounted engine - many fun facts were FMQ'd as the quilting into the quilt. It was interesting and fun to do, and I know the ultimate recipient (the quilt will be raffled off this weekend) will love it. (I titled the quilt "One Day in Stuttgart" because that's where the Beetle was engineered, by the way - a little fun fact for next time you want to impress your friends with useless trivia.) That's one reason I do things like this.
I guess the most important reason though, is that when you do a job for financial reimbursement (and there's nothing wrong with that, we've all enjoyed paying gigs!), the money flows through your hands too quickly, but when you give someone something that contains your blood, sweat, tears, and (most importantly) your love, the look on their face when they first see it will be something you can revisit for years...long after that money is gone.
It must be that time of the month or something, I'm normally not this mushy!
So....why do YOU do what you do?
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