The Man in the Wilderness Quilt Pt. 1

In the spring of 2012 I had this crazy idea. Driving through the country on my way home from work, through a misty rain I saw the brown and ochre landscape slowly giving way to the new bright green buds of the season. It was breathtaking. I knew I wanted to capture this color impression in a quilt.

 And then, on top of that idea, I had been listening to the Natalie Merchant album, Leave Your Sleep. On one of the tracks, Natalie puts music to the Mother Goose poem, The Man in the Wilderness. I loved that poem as a child and Natalie does it more than justice with her musical arrangement. Those colors and that poem were a match made in heaven for me. So I began my design.

Putting my graphic design skills to work, I laid out an arrangement of different sized blocks to fit within the constraints of the queen sized quilt I wanted to make (76" x 90"). I had no idea what was going to go inside those different blocks so I had to research beginner type quilt blocks that would fit in each space. I also specified six big patches to use for embroidery/applique of the poem.

This is the quilt's baby picture.

Now this quilt idea was crazy mostly because I had never really made a quilt and this quilt was going to be so big and include so many different kinds of blocks. As I learned, I thought I would share my knowledge with you as my scrappy log cabin, pinwheel, staggered strips, applique, and propeller quilt block tutorials. I'm so happy about the popularity of these tutorials because my intention was to help beginners like myself tackle some basic quilt blocks with as few tears as possible.

I took my time (obviously by the finish date on this project) and really tried to do things right as I went along. There were some frustrations and self-doubt but surprisingly few regrets. I loved the process and have already started my next project.

I did make the choice to have my quilt professionally quilted by our good friend Stitchlilly. Best. Decision. Ever. I chose an overall stipple pattern except for the applique areas. Those I did by hand with 6 strands of embroidery floss and no set-in-stone pattern. I wanted it to be a little more free-form and playful.

My next post will highlight some of the small details of this quilt an hopefully some better photos. New discovery of mine: photographing something so large is not easy!

–Cassandra

PS-I will admit, for a moment, as I was sewing up the colorful scrappy blocks...there was some small panic. Was this going to be too colorful? Obnoxious even? But I pressed on with fingers crossed. Did it turn out to be too much? Hells yes. But I love it anyway!

Inspired by Ingenuity

On my way home from work last night, I saw the kids in my neighborhood sledding down the hills in our valley. They were having the kind of fun in the snow that I thought only happened on covers of the Saturday Evening Post. After 7 years in this house, I still marvel at these things. A few minutes later, I was home, but still sitting in my car. I needed a moment to reflect back upon my own childhood in the snow before going in to start dinner...

We had quite an elaborate alleyway back home. It wasn't just one long strip behind the houses, but rather a more complicated system with multiple entrances and exits. All the blocks in the neighborhood were designed using this system. The alleyway exit that was closest to my house was quite steep (and very easy to bottom-out a big 70's sedan... learned that the hard way). For whatever reason, the houses were built much higher than the street on that side of the block. Ahhh, but when snow-covered, that steep exit was a great place to sled.

It was intimidating, standing at the top of the slope with your sled. All that concrete in front of you. And when you went down... you went like lightening. Inevitably, someone wiped out and got hurt, but we pressed on! You could never do this escapade by yourself because you needed at least one or two people to watch for (the pain in the butt) cars. My generation was not the first to sled down that alley, and I'm willing to bet that there are some little city mice still doing it. But, someone did it first. One snowy day, probably around 1910, some little person was inspired to slide down that hill.

And that is my favorite sort of inspiration. When you do better than "make do" with what you have in front of you. Lately, I am inspired by Alex who can take a rind from a chunk or parmesan cheese and corn meal and make a amazing polenta, Natalie Merchant who recently took children's poetry and made a hauntingly beautiful album called Leave Your Sleep, and Laura Ingalls Wilder who chronicled her life so profoundly in the Little House series. I am inspired by those who make, make and make. Luckily, that well never runs dry.

Speaking of making... here is a picture of the finished superhero guys waiting for their new little boys to discover them last Monday morning (St. Nicholas Day). Needless to say, I was so grateful that they were received with squeals of joy. This mommy was in a sewing frenzy all weekend!

 

Finn's loot.

Super-Bogart!

Talk to you soon everyone!

–Cassandra