Tied Together and Trimmed

Last Winter I was giving a spinning demonstration at a local arts event when a man stopped and asked me if I knew anything about wool batting for quilts and if I knew anyone who did sewing work. He asked because, as I was spinning wool, I was also discussing how to properly care for wool. “Yes”, I said, “and I also sew, what do you need done?” He had been given a wool quilt-bat that he wanted a cover made for. Something very simple that would protect it. Then he would put a duvet cover over it. “Yes, I can do that for you” I said.

This was going to be an easy project I thought. Sew some muslin fabric together and finish with a hand running stitch to hold the batting and fabric together. Once I got the batting home, I found I was out of muslin, so I had to reevaluate my plan. Now you ask, why didn’t I just run to the fabric store and buy more muslin? Well I live in the country, the kind of “country” that is an hour away from the nearest fabric store, and in addition, I had more than enough supplies on hand. I just had to be a little more creative and dig a little deeper into my rather large stash of fabric and supplies. Why do I have so much on hand you ask?

Well, years ago an elderly neighbor was moving and had a huge sewing room full of fabric, so what did she do with it all? She opened her door, put up a sign and welcomed anyone in who wanted fabric, to take it for free. I filled several bags and brought it all home, thinking that one day I would like to make a quilt. That was about 15 years ago. Now I

know any other sane crafter would have done the same, and it might still be in their craft room or boxes just waiting for the perfect project, no judgement here.

As I pulled the fabric bins out of the attic and started going through them, I realized that I was short on brown fabric. Yes brown. That was the color my new friend had asked for. Where could l find more brown fabric? Then a light bulb came on. What was in those boxes of quilt squares my mom’s cousin had given me several years ago when she moved? So now it was time to bring “those” boxes down from the attic. I asked my husband very nicely if he could go back up to the attic for “those” boxes. When I say “those”, let me be clear, “those” are seven boxes of quilt squares that she had “gifted” me. Again, no laughing. I’m sure you might have been asked the same questions, “What are those?”, “What are you going to do with those?” “Why do I have to move those again?”, and my personal favorite, “Why do you have so much stuff?”

So just a few details about my mom’s cousin Carol (which would make her my fist cousin once removed I think). Carol loved loved to sew; she sewed every day after she retired, she had a special room upstairs at her house and a custom sewing table that her husband made her, I now have that table. She used any fabric she could find, shopped the thrift stores for old sheets and interesting fabric, lucky for me, her one rule was that all the fabric had to be 100% cotton. Growing up she spent a lot of time at her grandmother’s farm, where her aunt (my grandmother Carmen) taught her how to sew - they were both “inside” girls.

Now sitting on the island of my rug, I started going through the mountain of squares that was my stash. I found a great pile of brown, yellow, and orange quilt squares, but not near enough to cover the whole batting. Carol, like me, has an eye for bright colors, so earth tones were very under-represented. So, back into the bins of fabric, again nothing that big, but enough earth tones hiding to edge the central quilt squares, and make a backing.

It was now time to call the customer, I mean my new friend, to see if he was ok with me trying something a little different than we had discussed. “No, it wasn’t going to cost any more, yes it will take me longer and be more work, but that is my choice.” He liked the idea and was happy to see what I would do for him.

Now might be a good time to mention that I have never made a quilt. I have sewn a lot, but never a quilt. How hard could it be? Sew the squares together, add some more fabric pieces to get to the correct size, make a backing, stuff the batting into the large case, and hand stitch together with a long running stitch. Ok quilters, I know you are now shaking your heads just a little and saying she doesn’t know what she just got herself into, it is not quite that easy. Trust me you can laugh a little, you won’t hurt my feelings. I laid the squares out in what I thought was a pleasing pattern, I had found five different sets of squares that worked well together and found some yardage that worked will with the squares. I wasn’t sure how I was going to layout that fabric yet, but I would figure it out after the squares were sewn together.

It was now time to out thread to fabric, so out came my trusty Singer Featherweight. Yes, one just like the one my grandmother Carmen taught me to sew on. I have her to thank for the machine which she found at a yard sale 30 years ago and bought it for me because she knew how much I liked hers. She confessed to me that “they only wanted $50 for it, which “wasn’t near enough, so I slipped them an extra $10”.

I started sewing the squares together in rows, then I would sew rows to rows. Things were going well, even if the squares were not all “square” or exactly the same size, they were close enough and I knew I could fix that. I promise I only had to take a couple of the rows apart because the squares were out of order. That they were out of order, I blame on the house ghost who must have moved things when I wasn’t looking. He is fondly known as the ghost of John, but that is a story for another time.

After the squares were all sewn together, I laid out the rest of my fabrics to get the front to size, found enough of one fabric to make the back, sewed the front and back together, put the batting inside, then got ready to hand stitch. This might be a good time to mention that I don’t have a quilting frame. Yes, quilters you can laugh a little bit, again. I now know why you use a quilt square, why there is usually a binding, and why it goes on at the end. As I sat with the quilt in my lap, safety pinned together to the best of my ability (I really needed more pins, but I had run out and as I mentioned earlier, I live in the middle-of-nowhere).

I embarked on the final step of hand sewing the running stitch. I only had to take out and redo maybe three (ok, let me be honest five) rows of stitching because I am a bit of a perfectionist and it was no big deal. How many hand stitched hems had my grandmother made me sew and then resew because they were pulling or puckering? She had taught me very well.

Oh, I almost forgot to mention that my grandmother worked for The Singer Sewing Machine Company,where she was a sewing instructor and when you bought a machine it came with lessons - she was the nice lady who gave you your lessons. So she did what she did with anyone who was interested, she taught me to sew, just as she had taught Carol. I can’t even begin to count the number of hours we spent sitting at her dining room table working on projects together, they are some of my very best memories.

Now back to the quilt project, and another piece to this circular puzzle. My new friend, the one I was making the quilt for, is from the same community where my grandmother was born and raised - I know how crazy is that? The same very small town and farming community, and where I visited when I say small. I mean 15 people currently live in town, of course more lived here when my grandmother was young, but it has never been a thriving metropolis. We moved to this very small town 7 years ago from our lifelong home in Seattle 1,500 miles away.

.Seattle was the city where my grandmother went for a vacation; was offered a job at the local Singer store, the store to which her manager (1500 miles away) had given her a

letter of introduction. So she did what any young women would do in 1940, she moved from the small town she grew up in halfway across the country for a job. There are also some stories that might mention a fiancé who was left behind as well, and my grandmother may have left a letter and a ring for her mother to deliver, but again that is another story.

Once settled in Seattle and working at her new job, she met my grandfather, got married, and started her new life. However, she made sure she returned to that small town of Carpenter, South Dakota every summer to visit her mother just as she had promised, and while she was there, she taught her niece Carol to sew. The same niece that ended up gifting me the many boxes of quilt squares. See how this keeps circling around with all the loose threads being neatly tied together and trimmed?

When the quilt, that wasn’t supposed to be a quilt, was finished I felt proud. It isn’t perfect. I know what I “should” have done and how I “could” have done it better, and next time I make a quilt it will be, because as you know I have many more boxes of squares for my next project. But this project was perfect, because it gave me a gift. It tied together three generations of women in my family who love or loved to sew, and it circled back to the place we call home. It made me treasure even more the gift my grandmother gave me, my cousin, and so many others when she taught us all how to sew. I have my grandmother’s sewing machine, plus the machine she brought me, and her scissors. Every time I work on a project, she is there with me. These days I always have a project going, my hands are always busy, and I hear my grandmother’s voice – “Well if it keeps you busy, it keeps you out of the pool hall”.