Making a quilt I (surprisingly) love

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Appliqued block 1/30, hah!

The Quilt of Grace has traveled from my office/sewing room to the living room sofa. That's a BIG MOVE. That means it is ready for all the hand-quilting, as well as applique, I can proffer for its completion. That means it's Kawandi-time!

I SO LOVE not needing a binding strip. I SO ADORE how crinkly is Kawandi stitching. I SO LOVE knowing that once I finish securing the last stitch I am truly DONE. No binding, um, I've already said that. Anyway.... Although, let me mention that I never detested making or hand-sewing bindings. What troubled me was wrestling a large or lap quilt under the presser foot to first secure that binding onto the quilt. I am SO OVER using my sewing machine, LOLOL! I'm so over a lot of things, but as my dad used to say, cry in one hand and want in the other and see which is filled the fastest.

(Took me AGES to understand that, which I never admonished to my own kids....)

Anyway again.... Sorting the top of this quilt wasn't simple, then it was. I wanted an abstract arrangement of the Lucy Boston blocks, maybe many bunched up along the right side as if hurled askew and that's how they stuck to the design wall. And while it sounds intriguing, actually laying them out so scattered quickly was an idea tossed in the round file. Yet laid out on point seemed...bland. Those large empty spaces screamed out for decoration, so I obliged. The result was TOO BUSY, even for me. And as this quilt is probably meant to stay at our house, I followed the dictates of my heart and pulled back a bit, instead inserting single two-inch hexagons in a range of prints. The LB blocks are from older fabrics, many from Joann, one reason I plan to keep this unless someone claims they can't live without it. The fabrics are a hodge-podge beyond any previous scrap quilt, the kind only a mother could love.

That mama is me! Past Me, Present Me, Future Me; we all agree that despite the blocks being kinda glitchy to stitch for the stiff papers and occasional thick fabrics as well as the uniqueness of said fabrics (a gentle way to say I'd not choose MANY of them now), somehow set upon four different hues of solids, gussied up with my latest fave prints as a slender border, as well as those pretty hexagons, I am IN LOVE with this quilt!

I can't overstate how the Lucy Boston blocks were for ages a drain on my soul. All the effort put into designing each block with MEH fabrics, sewing so many when I had time even though I wasn't itching to give this project my time, stashing them in a tote as if somehow the novel fairies would cart them off. Ah, the novel fairies.... Those fairies need to prod my subconscious because I'm down to one unreleased installment of The Enran Chronicles with SO MUCH LEFT TO SAY within that saga. Which is now starting to mirror the Lucy Boston blocks, which I thought I'd never actually use.

Perhaps the lesson here is this: Don't fret or sweat that saga, Present Me. Just let it sit in your brain as though the gray matter is a plastic tote, keeping safe vital details, rich characterizations, mesmerizing plot points. It's all gonna be fine AT THE RIGHT TIME. Which isn't now, ahem. Now it's time to put Lucy Boston to bed.

Unappliqued block and a Kawandi-style binding. No muss, no sewing machine fuss! (And no straight pins so I won't get poked, 'nuff said.)

Okay, all right! I get it, I mean, mentally I can wrap my head around it. It's not transference really, more like a lesson. Yet another life lesson, and how much did I enjoy appliqueing a block and a hexagon onto the pink Kona Melon late yesterday afternoon? HEAPS! And how much did I love Kawandi-style hand-quilting last night? GOBS! Gobs of love swirled around me as the needle was rocked while Seven of Nine became part of Voyager's crew, as our local news shared the weather, as Ziyal betrayed half of her heritage in "Sacrifice of Angels". Through all that I stitched and sewed, and threaded more needles and appliqued and sewed some more, that cotton fabric-y goodness filling my heart with purpose and joy.

I didn't think those LB blocks would be more than stones around my neck, weighing down my heart. I never planned to write a single Enran novel, much less four in one year. I always wanted to write fiction, never pondered making quilts. Didn't conjure living in Humboldt County, couldn't have considered the turmoil my nation currently experiences. Life is FILLED with the unexpected, unanticipated, yet at times most ALARMINGLY MARVELOUS gifts. Lucy Boston has been one of those. May you be graced with your own version of Lucy Boston today!

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