Storytorch

Over the past couple of days I quilted a full size top I made many years ago. I loaded it in the longarm machine Sunday afternoon, and, to my own amazement, took the last stitch about 9:30 Monday night. Once bound, the quilt will go to an Iowa couple who made a generous donation to Iowa Public Television during this year's IPTV Festival.

The simple Double Nine Patch was in my short stack of complete but unquilted projects. Just about every top I have finished over the years has gone immediately to a professional quilter because of some looming publication deadline. In my semi-retirement, I have happily gained respectable machine quilting skills. Making quilts entirely myself is delightful.

My now-quilted Double Nine Patch was produced during a series of two-hour lecture demonstrations I did on the East Coast about 15 years ago. For reasons important at the time, I spent three separate weeks making presentations in a regional chain of fabric stores, promoting a group of 1890s-style prints and the just-published Quilter's Complete Guide.

The daily schedule (11–1 in one location, 5–7 in another, with hours of driving between) involved missing both lunch and dinner every day for a week. What kept me going was turning out at least one Nine Patch block per day (while talking), meeting some nice quilters, and winding up with a beautiful quilt top in the end.

Each time I longarm quilt a quilt, I get going at a snail's pace. I'm slow at loading the machine, and the first row of stitching seems to take forever.

Soon, though, I get in the groove. The hum of the needle becomes music. I reach the center row and realize I'm starting to finish! I see that a project I began weeks, months, maybe years ago is about to be transformed into an actual quilt. For my Double Nine Patch, the start and finish dates actually span the turn of a century.

Happily, I've kept back a half yard of the navy blue moon-and-stars fabric all these years, so the binding will match.

Today's Fortune Cookie Fortune:
You will be satisfied with your work.