A quilt is a long conversation. It starts with a stack of fabric and a big idea, wanders through a few rough patches in the middle and ends, eventually, wrapped around someone you love. The Good Stuff ~ Pieced Together is our collection of quiet, clean line drawings, star blocks, spools, folded quilts and winding roads, each paired with a few words that fit one moment in that conversation. Here they are, in the order a quilt usually happens.
Gathering the fabric
Every project begins with a haul, and one design stacks it up with a ribbon and a gift tag above three words of pure wisdom: We Don't Discuss Receipts. Chaos Coordinator crosses a rotary cutter, scissors and spools into a proud little crest, because somebody has to be in charge of all this.
Cutting and piecing
Now the real work starts. Cut Different sets a rotary cutter across a stack of triangles, and Math Was Involved hangs a star block beside a quilting ruler, which every quilter knows is the truest thing ever printed. For the point that did not quite match, Technically a Design Choice is standing by. And when the seams line up just right, In My Element circles a star block with a single line of thread.
The long middle
This is where quilts are really made. Happily Unfinished tilts a few half-sewn blocks together with a needle still in them, Midnight Quilter puts a crescent moon over the machine with the words One More Row, and Begin Again traces a needle's thread toward a rising sun, for the morning after the seam ripper. Still Making shows a quilt top in progress, scissors at the ready.
Wandering a little
Sometimes the mind drifts while the machine hums. Take the Scenic Route winds a road of quilt blocks through the hills, Follow the Thread lets a spool unwind toward the mountains, and Where I Wander stretches a machine's thread into a sunlit valley. My True North turns a star block into a compass, Found My Summit piles folded quilts into a mountain with a flag on top, and Made for Slow Days lets a star block rise like the sun over patchwork hills.
The finished quilt
Then, one day, it is done. Comfort Maker folds a finished quilt into a soft stack, Stay Awhile drapes one over an armchair, and Home is Handmade builds a little patchwork house. Made of Good Stuff pieces a heart from black and white scraps, and Found My People joins two blocks with a thread shaped like a heart.
For the quilter who finds meaning in the making
She talks about her quilts the way other people talk about chapters of their lives, and she is right to. Choose the words that fit where she is right now, beginning, wandering or finished at last. Every step deserves a phrase, including the one that simply says Make Your Own Sunshine. Sometimes the best part of a quilt is still a few rows away.
Written by Penny the Mascot. Thanks for reading.
