Happy Mother's Day

When I was a little girl, my mom had a special box that she kept in the linen closet at the top of the stairs. Inside the box was a 
1930’s Dresden Plate quilt made by her grandmother. From time to time I would rummage around under the stacks of sheets and towels to find that box, get it down and carefully unfold that beautiful old quilt. I loved it. It captured my imagination. I loved to pore over the vintage fabric and trace the stitching with my fingers. I used to picture my great great grandmother stitching it and when I grew up I knew that I wanted to make a quilt just like it.

 Years later, living in England with 3 children under three, my mom treated me to an Adult Education course on Patchwork and Quilting. The course kept me sane and I became well and truly hooked. Over the next 10 years we had 3 more children and I managed to make lots and lots of tops. I loved collecting fabric and playing with colour and pattern. But I struggled with the quilting. Life was busy. I felt guilty about rarely finishing my projects. Quilting by hand was not remotely possible. I was bored with stitch-in-the-ditch but found free-motion quilting a pain the neck. My collection of un-finished-objects grew and grew and I felt stuck. In 2003 my mom gave me a table top quilting frame for Christmas, probably the best Christmas present ever, and I’ve been happily free-motion quilting ever since. 

Looking back at my first ever blog post I realize that most of my quilting milestones were instigated by my mother.  My mom is an amazing woman and I have lots to be grateful for. 
So thanks mom! Thanks for all you are and all you do! I wouldn’t be happy or here without you. 
Happy Mother’s Day!

Source: machinequilter.blogspot.co.uk via Martha on Pinterest

Happy Mother's Day!

Today is UK Mother's day! So Happy Mother's Day to all English 'mums'! My kids are so sweet and although they celebrate on the English day they always spell 'mom' the American way! Whenever it happens, Mother's Day is a day to be grateful for the mothers in our lives. And I am grateful for mine! My mom sent me these beautiful folksy chairs that I have such fond memories of from my grandmother's kitchen. Paul sanded and cleaned them up and now it gives me great joy to have them in my kitchen. The cobalt blue vase is also something from my nana given to me by my mom.

Part of my present was time to quilt so I was able to finish a project we started during the filming session for the new Beyond the Sea DVD trailer last week.

The stripy blue and lavender table runner was fun to quilt. The scalloped border is so whimsical. It still needs the binding but it looks pretty hanging on my Rayburn range. The kids are making dinner so I have time to blog.

Happy Mother's Day to all you mom's out there! None of us would be here without you!

Mother's Day

This photo shows my kids nine years ago. Peter, the baby, is just about 4 months old. Ellie with the hat and no hair is nearly 2, Rosie in pink is 4, Emily, holding Peter and her twin Ben are 8 and Katie, the red head in the middle is 10. Thinking back, that was such a busy time.

My friend Eileen came over for a visit that summer. Eileen has a gift for helping people to get vision for what they want to do in their lives. Often we get so used to just doing the next thing that we loose sight of what our real dreams and hopes are. Eileen asked me what I would want to do if money and time were not an issue. I said, "Make a quilt for everyone that I love!" But the way life was, I never thought it would happen.

A couple years later my mom sent me a machine quilting frame. This didn't change the amount of time I had left over for quilting but it did mean that I could make the most of it. And within a few years I really did finish lots of quilts. Not yet for EVERYONE I love, but at least I've made a good start.

So Happy Mother's Day to my mom in America and mothers everywhere. I'm so glad to have lovely little people to quilt for and I'm grateful for my mother too!