With the exception of polyester, there's really nothing you could add to a quilt that would be wrong, but many quilters are way too fearful. "The colors must all match exactly", "I want it to look exactly like the one in the magazine", or "I can't do that. It's too hard." So they buy quilt kits with the fabric pre-selected and attend classes where the prevailing themes are "Get it Done Fast and Easy."
Quilting should be about fun and creativity. It should be about quality, not quantity. It should be about the experience of quilting, not the end result, especially when the end result is a pile of quilts with absolutely no personality.
I'm guilty too. I want to design quilts, but I'm afraid I'm not good enough, my ideas aren't intricate enough. I bought quilts at an auction Sunday, (it's like going to an animal shelter and wanting to make sure all the puppies have a good home) and the quilts I fell in love with weren't particularly intricate. One was scrappy; one was posies in pots. They weren't complicated, just exquisitely pieced and appliqued. Their beauty was in the execution and in the time the quilter spent working on them.
How many times have I heard it? It's not the destination; it's the journey. It's the time we spend on vacation looking around, soaking up the experience, talking to the locals , not the pictures or the t-shirts we can show people when we get home. It's not the quilt-in-a-day that you forget you have because you have nothing invested in it. It's the one that takes a year, the one where you remember every stitch, especially the ones where you poked yourself and bled on the fabric, the one where Sun Bonnet Sue looks like the Flying Nun or your appliqued flowers grow backwards.
It's not about being perfect. It's about having perfect moments.
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