SUZANNE PRATT wrote in a message to PAT KNOX:
 SP> Have you ever noticed how quilting stetches across generations?  I
 SP> learned to do serious quilting from a group of 80 year old ladies
 SP> at a methodist church group a decade or so ago -- they quilted to
 SP> have some social time and to raise money for the church.  (They did
 SP> GOOD quilting, too).  I was in my late 20s at the time and never
 SP> felt out of place, etc.   
I wish that I had been as lucky as you to have had a group to get together
with to learn from.  I learned four years (and 20+ quilts ago) on my own.
There were guilds in my area, but with my job (on call 24 hours a day, 7 
days a week) I couldn't join one or take any classes.  My first quilt, 
otherwise known as the "Green Abomination" is in four or five different
shades of green, no other colors anywhere!  I actually got the President's
Choice award for an unfinished object on this from my guild.  I even entered
it in my guild's "Ugly Quilt Contest" and got NO votes!  I have been quilting
ever since, fortunatly my quilts keep getting better and better!
 SP>  
 SP> Now I'm quilting a lot again and my 3 girls that I still have at
 SP> home get more interested each day.  I guess they have to out of
 SP> self-defense since I quilt and then we go to "Aunt Patti's" and she
 SP> quilts too.  I have been putting together an album quilt that I
Glad that you are still working on it!!  Have you had to cut out anymore
pieces yet?  :)
 SP> Now, the sewing part goes pretty fast - I piece on the machine. 
 SP> But  the deicision process of which colors to use together to
 SP> maintain a scrappy look but also not have it clash takes me a
 SP> while.  My 8 year old daughter, Elizabeth, kept wanting to help. 
What an eye she has too!!
 SP> dislikes.  They also have a great eye for color -- much better than
 SP> mine, I'm afraid.  So, here we sit -- the 3 of us working on this
They aren't afraid to experiment.  You have a very good eye Suzi, you just
need more self-confidence in yourself!  Believe me I have been where you are
(and still are at times).
 SP> quilt top when the 17 year old comes up, watches for a while, and
 SP> wants to do it too.  So she laid out some blocks.  Looking over the
 SP> heads bowed in concentration as they put together their blocks --
 SP> from the 4 year old's curley head to my 17 year old -- I was amazed
 SP> at how much all of us were enjoying this -- no generation gap; no
 SP> sibling rivalry, just quilting.   
That is a good feeling, isn't it!!  Fun for the whole family!
 SP>  
 SP> Well, now my 17 year old, Emilie, has decided that she is going to
 SP> do a quilt for her boyfriend.  She decided on a log cabin quilt. 
 SP> She went thru my fabric stash -- she has good taste -- took some of
 SP> my best pieces.  She has a huge pile of fabric -- 17 different
 SP> fabrics for this quilt.  She pieced 3 blocks yesterday; they are
 SP> not very consistent in size (from 9 to 10 inches) but she hasn't
 SP> been sewing long and we can square them up.  The blocks though are
 SP> gorgeous.  She has it figured out how many she needs, etc.  It
 SP> should be a beautiful quilt.  Now if I could just get my sewing
 SP> machine back so I can quilt!!!! 
Tell Emmie that Chris is wanting to start quilting again too (he has done
some hand-piecing in the past).  His first quilt is to be a Log Cabin also.
We bought a kit at Assembly Day that he liked.  All of the cutting is done
(yea!!) for you already (at least the strips and the centers are).  The quilt
is FLANNEL and has 33 different fabrics in it.  It should make a nice lap
quilt.  He will be using mom's old Singer to do it so that I can quilt at
the same time (Liza's is first, can't find my Sunbonnet Sue templates--Doris
borrowed them and hasn't returned them yet).  Ought to be a hoot!
Later!,
           Pat 
--- timEd/386 1.10+
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