My Quilting Journey

March is National Quilting Month which is an extended celebration of National Quilting Day, which this year is on Saturday March 16th. This event has been acknowledged and celebrated every year in March since 1991, by those who love to quilt, everywhere around the world.

I have loved sewing since I was 11 years old when I was given a sewing machine by my Great Aunt Grace, and she and my Granny introduced me to their fabric stashes! The colours and designs of the fabrics really inspired me, and in those days they bought in bulk from textile mills in the UK. My sewing history started with making clothes for my Sindy doll, then to making clothes for myself. I've made patchwork quilts, handbags and purses and plenty of sewn gifts for the people in my life.

My own quilting journey started around 2012. I had two small nieces and I thought they would be ideal recipients for a quilt each! They were lap sized quilts made up of different coloured squares, not very exciting designs, but good practice. Unfortunately when I was looking for photos I couldn't find any, I had an issue with my laptop last year and I think they were wiped!

In 2013 I left my job and went travelling for 3 months. Of course wherever I went I had to find fabric shops! Whilst in Australia I picked up a quilt pattern from a quilt shop which I made for my Mum when I got home. This pattern really appealed to me as there is hand stitching involved too in the form of embroidery. The hearts were appliqued and hand stitched on to the background using a blanket stitch. I have the pattern somewhere and one day I may get around to making it again! Most of the fabrics I used were Tilda.

Once I had finished with my travels I moved to Bournemouth to be near my parents, and here I joined a local sewing group. The first project I decided to embark on was a double quilt, which featured half square triangles, traditional piecing and appliqued flowers! Having never stitched anything of this size, this was going to be fun! Unfortunately it has been living under my bed and has never been finished, perhaps this is the year I get it backed and quilted.

Moving forward to about 8 years ago, after visiting a craft show and picking up a pack of hexagonal EPP (english paper piecing) paper templates, and 4 Fat Quarters designed by Lewis and Irene, I designed a fox wall hanging on Quilters Graph Paper, and set about hand stitching approx 180 3" hexagonals together! For a first attempt at designing I was quite pleased with how it came out!

There have been plenty of projects inbetween, far too many to show in one blog post! But that brings me to the present day and what I am designing and making now.

Running a fabric business means not having a lot of time to do sewing for yourself, so to satisfy my quilting obsession and introduce other people to the various forms and skills of patchwork and quilting, I started a bi-monthly quilting subscription box in November 2023, the Fabulous Quilters Club. So I now get to design and make projects for other people to make, best of both worlds!

Happy Quilting!