I don't like purple

I don't like purple.



And yet there I am, wearing a purple shawl which I made. With purple yarn.



I am not ashamed to admit that I am loving this shawl, even with it's rampant purpleness.



Late one night - one very cold night when all I could think of was crocheting warm and pretty things -  I was seduced by Suzy Haufrau's online shop, and somehow I couldn't resist some nice yarn in aubergine. What. The. Heck. Aubergine is a colour best seen in an eggplant curry, as far as I'm concerned. I am not sure what came over me, but doctors suspect that my mouse clicking finger had identified a purple-deficiency in my system.



The yarn is Holst Garn (75% wool and 25% silk) and the pattern is a free Japanese one called "210-211-34 Triangle Shawl" by Pierrot Yarns. It was a very easy pattern but so effective once blocked. I think I'll be making this one again, for a gift perhaps. I've ravelled it over here.

Last night I started a crochet test for a scarf/shawl called "Dorothy's Tail". Yep - that Dorothy. You'll see what I mean when I share the photo with you.



I love this pattern very much. The yarn is hand dyed merino/cashmere nylon which friends gave me instead of flowers when I was in hospital. There is love in every metre of yarn. And there is an inside joke about this shade of yellow, but I'll share it with you once the scarf is finished.

Age old

Yesterday I attended the Canberra Quilters' annual exhibition. It was outstanding, and astounding. I'd share photos with you but the rules on entering the exhibition are that you can take photos but not blog them without permission of the quilter. Fair enough. So they will stay on my C: drive and I shall treasure them in private.

While at the quilt show, I popped into the craft fair and stocked up on quilting supplies. No fabric (because I am struggling to use up what I have), but the next best thing in my opinion - rulers, pins, rotary blades and a big floor lamp for using next to my sofa.



There's nothing quite like the feeling of using new pins. These ones are by Clover and I've been using them for years. I find them to be the sharpest and best. I think I'm up to my fifth set of them!

I also did a craft circle on making Kanzashi flowers. It was held by Jill from Kimoyes, a Canberra business. She was so generous with her time, and I think I will become addicted to making these flowers before too long. I can also see a class on these at Brown Owls in the future.



So back to the quilt show. The winning quilt was made by Helen Godden. I met Helen years ago when she first started quilting, and  this girl is a true artist (and a really, really lovely person to boot). She doesn't tend to piece her quilts, but paints them, and sometimes bleaches them. And then she quilts the guts out of them. Not just any quilting - beautiful flowing quilting that makes perfect sense when you see it in the quilt. I can share her winning quilt with you on this blog because I didn't take the photo, and the photo wasn't taken at this exhibition - it was taken at Houston.



Photo taken by By dr_l_rock


Gorgeous, isn't it?

And if you read the Canberra Times you may have read a lovely article about Helen, her mum Pat and her daughter Inneke. It's so nice to see the younger generations taking up quilting. (I just made myself sound really, really old).

I was at quilt guild the other night with another young (but a little older than me) friend and I mentioned to my friend about joining guild as a fairly new quilter in my early 30s and how I was one of the younger quilters in the guild at the time. And now 10 years later I am 41 years old, and I am still one of the youngest quilters in the room. I think that quilting is for all ages, and it saddens me that the local guild doesn't have many young quilters in it. Or maybe they are there, and just can't abide the meetings.

I know that the young quilters exist - I read enough blogs from people much younger than me who are quilting, designing, writing books, designing fabric. And I know that locally there young quilters - I see them at my local quilt shop, at Brown Owls and at the classes that are held around the place. Is the guild that unfriendly and "exclusive" than younger quilters aren't attracted to join it? Are the books in the library too much about Thimbleberries and civil war quilts, and not enough about modern quilts? Or are people just not interested enough to join?

Is it that the younger generation of quilters are all "modern quilters", whatever that means, and therefore not interested in a guild which can be a little fuddy duddy at times? (I can say that - I used to be the vice president years ago.) In which case, is it time to start a Modern Quilt Guild here in our town? I know that the art quilters have their own group within the guild, and that seems really lively and energetic.

I think quilting is such a beautiful hobby and is, at it's soul, inclusive (think of the old quilting bees!), and it worries me when age groups seem to be left behind. This is not a rant against older quilters. I love older quilters - their energy and drive and passion for quilting knows no bounds. But I suppose I wanted to write about this as food for thought for those of us in guilds and those of us not in guilds, and how we can encourage other people to quilt and love it as much as we do. Being all cliquey and exclusive about it isn't going to help. You don't have to be in a guild to be a quilter, but on the other hand it doesn't pay to be a guild and not be able to attract all kinds of quilters.

And for heaven's sake, the members of the guild could be a lot friendlier than what they currently are. It costs nothing to be nice. Just saying.

In other (non-ranty) news I've been busy today cutting out bags for the next yarn/bag club. I've been a bit tardy, as this is the winter club and we only have a couple of weeks left before spring is officially upon us.



These are my new labels. I hate them. My old labels were bigger, and so much nicer, and they are from the same label maker too. These take twice as long to sew onto my bags because they are smaller and more fiddly for my big hands. I am tempted to complain, but in the meantime I need to get my sewing on. I shall complain later.

This wonky life

It's almost as if my life parallels the quilt I am currently making. This quilt = wonky.



My life = also wonky. But I'm working on it. Recovery from major surgery is hard, and long, and so, so slow. But this quilt is helping me feel more normal, and it's giving me energy thinking of all the quilts that are going to come after this one.



I finished the wonky quilt top this morning. After looking at the quilt blocks with the grey and white backgrounds on the design wall for a couple of days, I decided that the grey made the blocks sink into the background fabric, whereas the white gave the blocks more dimension. This is not a quilt that wants to hide, so I went with the white.



Anyway, I really like this quilt. A lot. I think it's clever that it is made from only two fabrics, but looks like it has been made from sixteen. I like that yet again I've broken every rule in the quilting rule book. I like that this quilt possesses my thoughts during the day, and in my dreams, as I come up with ways to make it really sing with what I have in my stash.

I still have to make the backing and scrounge for some batting in the stash baskets. I want this quilt to be made entirely of stash materials. But while the quilt top was still on the design wall this afternoon I decided to work out how I was going to hand quilt it.



A ruler, an erasable pencil, and some imagination is all it took. Once the backing and batting have been sourced, I'll layer them all together and make this the project that keeps my knees warm for the rest of winter while I hand quilt it.



In searching for perle cottons to quilt with, though, I came up short. I want the colours to be perfect, and these are not the right ones for this quilt.

Looks like I'll have to go shopping after all.




P.S I had one project bag left over from the market in July, so I've listed it on Etsy in case you were interested.