Quilting is IT

I remember my senior year in high school, when I conned my way into an advanced independent study in art class…

I don’t remember the teacher’s name, however. At some point I’ll look it up, maybe. That’s not the crux of the story though, which is that I’d never had even one art class up to that time, much less those that should have led up to an independent study in art class. What I thought I wanted to do at the time was paint, and I had little desire to lay pencil to paper and learn basics before I could get my brush into the paint. Well, the class was a blast and in addition to trying to paint “right out of the box” as it were, I did other things like pottery and silk screening. I realize now that what I really wanted was to play with color and paint was just the medium that I had knowledge of and limited experience with at the time. All these years later, I’ve now found the perfect medium: fabric. Yeah, back then I played with fabric and made my clothes and prom dresses, but now I’ve found quilting. Quilting is IT for me.

It’s the combination of colors and textiles that does it for me, I think. It’s also designing, problem solving, a little math here and there (which I always enjoyed, believe it or not, and was pretty good at), setting and meeting goals and getting those “atta girl” and sense of accomplishment feelings when something goes well. I don’t think painting would have held all that for me, even if I’d stuck with it. (Here’s a good one for you: I carried the paints I bought in high school around from place to place until probably 5 years ago, now how silly is that? That’s just me being a packrat!) Well, maybe painting would have provided everything but the textiles and the math, but still, fabric splatters are easier to clean out of the carpet.

Share This