Why I quilt~

I have always worked with my hands fashioning objects I could wear, eat, give away, sell, hang or frame. I have crocheted booties and lacey doilies, baked pastries and decorated cakes, sewn prom dresses and Halloween costumes, knitted afghans and wool socks, molded soap and fancy chocolate candies, trained as a County Extension Master Gardener and long ago tended an extensive vegetable and perennial garden.

I am often asked how long I have been quilting and I cannot pinpoint a certain movement of time when the transition between seamstress and quiltmaker occurred. 

In 1974 I pieced my first quilt.  It was made of 6" squares of a shimmery type of bridal satin I had purchased at the local fabric store. It was silky and elegant, had a lustrous sheen and the colours were the ones I am still drawn to today; hues of periwinkle, violet and indigo. Embroidery threads secured the layers together and it was large enough for a full size bed. Somewhere in the course of making comforters, usually constructed with preprinted fabric panels, I began the process of making a quilt, "three layers secured with stitching". In 1990 the journey really began with a lap sized Trip Around the World that I machine pieced and hand quilted. As this is one of the 2-½ quilts that I had hand quilted, it is a rather unique part of my collection!

A small community in SW Washington is the place I call home, where my husband, two almost grown kids and four cats carefully maneuver their way through fabric, books and pins.