Preparations for not sewing

I’ve promised not to take a sewing machine with me on a family trip (it’s supposed to be a “vacation” and the sewing and quilting is my job, right?), but I didn’t make any promises about hand sewing projects!  I picked up some Art Gallery fabric to try my hand at broderie perse and applique, and maybe finish up the owl I was *thiseclose* to completing from my class at QuiltCon (there’s a picture of me, fourth one down! Crazy.) with Debbie Grifka of Esch House Quilts.

One of the things I really liked about taking this applique class was how you could really sink into your work and still be able to talk and chat to those around you.  There wasn’t the noise of a machine to talk over, the danger of a finger to sew over, and you could sit facing the person with whom you were conversing.  While I knew about the talk-y nature of handwork, it really sunk in during that class.  My grandfather was a boy of 6 carding batting for the women as they made quilts during the Depression, and often spoke of how they had ALL sorts of interesting conversations while they worked, and didn’t think a little boy would be listening in.  He said he learned some really interesting things about the neighbors.

On another note, I’ve been reading the Anne of Green Gable series again this week, and have been poking around for the cotton-warp knitted quilt patterns (tobacco-leaf and apple-leaf) that Mrs. Rachel Lynde was always making.  Turns out there isn’t really a pattern that anyone knows of for these, but that it may be that they are often knit in small units and then sewn together: a knitted quilt.  There, there’s also this: a knitted coverlet from a time and place contemporaneous.  If I really cared for knitting, I might try my hand at this, but… I don’t care for knitting all that much.  And I admit, now WONDER the Avonlea ladies were awed that she had made over sixteen.

Anyhoo.  I will probably ve posting sporadically as internet activity allows.  Have a good one, all!