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Saturday, December 16, 2017

Lucky


Invariably I’ve found myself on the right side of lucky. It’s what happens when you expect the best and deal with the worst. This is a light hearted post, but I want to say one more time, a resounding YES to the women of Alabama.

We all have been making and using luck for close to a year now.

Luck can’t be used up, only used. I love the stuff.

I’m descending here, as in a balloon. From the big concept of luck to little bits that can be pieced together. How lucky I have nothing much to do and all day to do it. Have a granddaughter who began at age seven to piece quilts, knows how to match points and iron seams. How lucky for our friend who is a charming scatterbrain that she mentioned in the nick of time she wanted to make a quilt for her mother for Christmas.

The best luck of this quilt is that Kay can sit on Christmas day, as the household bustles around her, and chat with her mother and sew down the quilt binding.

I stopped to write this, waiting for Kay and her boys to come work on the quilt. Laura is leaving for a day with her mother, and maybe siblings, so the little house will only be close to bursting at the seams. The blocks all are sewn, trimmed, pressed, laid out as they will be sewn together.

After Kay sees the proposed layout, we will stack up and label each row, 1, 2, etc. But, more sewing than already done lies ahead. 


Each block will be separated by a strip, called a sashing, a half to an inch wide. We haven’t decided yet. It will affect the overall size of the quilt, of course. A block will be set at the intersection of the sashings around each block. My sister calls these the cornerstones. It’s part of the process of keeping a quilt square, a solid piece that can be quilted without shifting.

A quilt is a piece of construction, like anything else. Do it right, it’s done forever. It will be admired for generations, and folks will say, “How lucky you are to still have this.”

Actually, I’m really looking forward to watching Kay teach two boys how to use a rotary cutter to make pieces of the quilt for their grandmother. I’ll post more pictures, maybe tomorrow.

34 comments:

  1. This is shaping up to be a beauty. How lucky it was mentioned in time.

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  2. How pretty! And yes, thanks be to the women of Alabama!

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  3. Great work so far! Love the group effort to make it too. How special is that!

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  4. Those boys are lucky to be a piece of family history in the making.

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  5. Luck is a beautiful thing and the best luck is that which we make ourselves. Have a great weekend.

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  6. more and more boys and men are learning and doing household chores and creative processes once reserved for women, good for them.

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  7. How lucky is every one around you to have you there.

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  8. I really hope there is no blood involved! I can't use a rotary cutter very well from worrying about which finger I'm going to cut off.

    You're so right about hoping for the best and dealing with the worst. It doesn't solve everything, but it goes a long way for the solvable stuff.

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  9. Super impressed at all those crisp blocks. And grateful to the women of Alabama.

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  10. It's going to be SO beautiful when it's all done! It's beautiful ALREADY!

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  11. What I find so magical about quilts is the infinite number of designs that can be created with simple triangles, squares, and a creative use of color.
    I've just finished - and for the first time, had professionally quilted - two baby quilts for the incoming grand-twins. And yes, we're beside ourselves with excitement.

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  12. The quilt is becoming very stylish. Both you and Laura have been working like demons !
    The boys might really take to block making ... it is construction , after all

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  13. Stitching bits of inexhaustible luck together. Nice.

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  14. What a beautiful family heirloom that quilt will be!

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  15. It's a splendid quilt. It makes me think of all the homemade quilts on the beds at my grandparents' farm. There is nothing warmer.

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  16. Oh my, how beautiful that is, it's coming along so fine!

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  17. The quilt will be beautiful.

    Love,
    Janie

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  18. Oh Joanne, what a grand quilt. The piecing is well done.

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  19. Can't wait to see the finished quilt.

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  20. Hari OM
    We make our luck...it arises from Love and that quilt already carries so much Love in its cloth! YAM xx

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  21. I've only taken to quilting in the last few years. I do enjoy it, but hand quilting is much too tedious for me. However, I do admire someone who can do fine hand quilting. And I'm so glad that your quilt will be ready for Christmas!

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  22. This is going to be a magnificent work of art when finished.

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  23. When does the quilting part get done? Just on the top piece or with the batting in place? Or is the whole thing quilted, top, batting and backing?

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  24. We will deliver to my sister three separate pieces; the pieced top, the bat and the backing. They go on her quilting machine separately, and she sews them together, through and through. Her blog is http://janicelovestoquilt.blogspot.com/
    and there are good pictures on it.

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    1. If you go back to last December, a picture of the machine being set up in her new studio.

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  25. Trust women to do the impossible...and perfectly.

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  26. Someone is lucky to get that quilt.

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  27. yes, lots of luck there. and what a great present it will be. I've only made one quilt in my life and that was with my granddaughter during one of her weeks. she designed it, we bought the material, cut it, sewed it, got the backing and and the bat and sewed the binding all in one week. didn't quilt it though. the next week I tacked it on a 6" grid.

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  28. Thanks to Alabama abd tge African American vote. And that quilt is wonderful!!

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  29. I was so pleased when I heard the Alabama result. It was a real beacon of light.

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  30. Positive thinking at all time. It works.

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