Fifteen + Years in the Making ….. or Never Give Up

I started this project while living in New Castle, DE. That was before living on our sailboat for two years - so that means I started this quilt probably about 1998?? It was a block-of-the-month quilt - I ordered it from a shop in Pennsylvania They would send me one chicken block and all the fabric needed to create it each month. The big rooster in the center block was the last to arrive.

The concept was that you would have time each month to finish one block and then be excited to receive the next. Many quilters cut out each piece and hand appliquéd them to the background fabric. I'm not a hand appliqué-er so mine were cut and fused to the fabric. Much easier and faster and I knew it was the only way I'd ever have this quilt.

I assembled the entire top, added the batting and blocks of color for the backing, pinned the layers together - and then I started to hand quilt it. I did enjoy (at that point) hand quilting….so was making good progress. Then we made the big move - sold the house and moved aboard our sailboat for two years. The quilt went into storage at my mother-in-law's house. When we came back we moved to an apartment in Milwaukee, I went to work full-time and basically stopped hand quilting. So the project remained folded and unfinished. I would take it out to look at it every once in awhile, with good intentions, then think "nah"….and roll it back up again.

When we moved from the apartment to our house in Bayview I did hang the unfinished project on a rod in the basement play/sewing area. It brightened the room and it was fun to look at. I continued to ignore the fact that it was half-quilted and half-pinned.

A few weeks ago a group of my quilting friends came to the house for our every-other-month gathering. This is a small group organized to inspire each other to think outside the box, help each other solve problems and cheer each other on to try new things. Of course we all marched down to see my quilting area. When I showed them the chicken quilt and explained why it would never be finished (no more hand quilting for me!) they all said "just finish it by machine!" Hmmmmmm……now why didn't I think of that???

The next day the quilt came off the wall - I worked on the machine quilting for two days, the border over a weekend and there it was - finished! The quilt still happily hangs in my basement sewing area - but it's DONE! And I challenge anyone (at least if they look from a distance) to see that it is half hand and half machine stitching.

So what's the lesson here? "Slow and steady wins the race?" (No.) "Think outside the box?" (Yes.) "Good things come to those who wait?" (Maybe.) "Some things take time? (For sure.) "Never give up?" (YES!) "Count on your friends?" (YES) All I know is that this quilt now makes me happy every time I see it instead of sort of making me "sad" that it would never be finished.

So thank you to my quilting friends - for helping me to look at this project from a new angle. :-)