My Comforter

Making quilts can be a long process, and that's what I like about them. If I want instant craft gratification (should that be craftification?), I'll make a small sample or quilt block, a toy or something to hold knitting and sewing equipment. These 'little' projects, far from being meaningless fripperies, often provide the perfect opportunity to play around with techniques, that can be stored in the 'must do more of' part of the brain, and later used in larger pieces.

Some things in life shouldn't be rushed though, and so far, my Chinese Coins quilt has taken over 8 months to make, and yet, I'm still a few weeks away from the finished article. All of which is fine by me, but I wouldn't want to bore anyone with weekly stitch by stitch updates-especially as my quilt might not to be everybody's liking, because it's a bit 'artisan' and wonky. In fact, I wonder if calling it a quilt might be stretching the word's meaning since it involves very little complicated piecing together of fabrics, and absolutely no machine quilting wizardry.

However, I have reached a significant milestone in the making of my quilt, and have, at last finished all of the hand quilting and embroidery. I should feel happy about this, but instead feel rather sad, almost as if I'm saying goodbye to an old friend who's kept me company over recent months. It won't be long now before the quilt is on our bed and I'll have to share my 'friend' with my husband! I suppose I could, like Penelope, unpick all my stitching each night, but that seems like such a waste of effort. Besides, I don't have a band of suitors to fend off as I wait for an itinerant husband to return from the Trojan war.

Another reason for my reluctance to say goodbye to cosy evenings spent embroidering the linen strips is procrastination. Now they are finished, I have to get on with the less pleasant task of putting the strips together. First, I have to roll back the rugs and clean the floor so I can lay out my strips to see how much trimming and jiggery-pokery needs to be done. Then there's the fiddly matter of machine sewing the top of the strips together before I can tidy up the back with some more hand-sewing (you can see I've made a start in the above picture). And it's the hand-sewing I like most of all–and can't wait to resume. You can't beat having a quilt on your lap (no matter how unfinished) for keeping you warm and chasing the Winter blues away.

Elizabeth,
x.