Kaffe Fassett's Kaleidoscope of Quilts

Denyse Schmidt Quilts

The Gentle Art of Quiltmaking by Jane Brocket

I've never been someone who sews. When I was 12, I was in a 4-H club that did “domestic” type projects. Sewing and basic cooking were the main subjects. We also had our colors done (I'm a “winter”), decorated shirts with puff paint (yes...it was 1989), and learned about table settings and table manners. One of my projects for the county fair was a pair of bermuda shorts in cool Miami pastels. I loved these shorts, but sewing them was a pain. Our sewing machine was temperamental at best, and my mom wasn't too familiar with how to use it. I had dreams of making other clothes, but after the harsh reality of putting these shorts together, I scrapped the dreams of blouses and dresses, and of sewing altogether.

I'm not sure what has sparked my recent interest in quilts, but at a recent trip to the library, I picked up a few books to look at the colors and patterns. The three I found represent a good range of simple to moderately challenging patterns. The use of color was very interesting to me. The different authors of course have different styles. Denyse Schmidt uses prints more sparingly, while Kaffe Fassett uses a large range of tumultous prints. My favorite of the books is Jane Brocket's The Gentle Art of Quiltmaking. I love her style and the quilts are all simple shapes; squares and rectangles. I'm not about to start quilting, but I can certainly see the appeal.

Of course, I am working on a type of quilt: my sock yarn blanket. Since J's birth, I haven't been knitting anything too involved or large. The little mitered squares are just the ticket. I am putting this blanket together in the most time-consuming way possible. I knit all the little squares separately, then occasionally lay them out and pick out groups of four to join into a larger square. These larger squares will all be connected in a way yet to be determined. I wanted to be able to have some control over the placement of the squares and not just add to the blanket as I obtained the mini-skeins. Also, I prefer the arrangement of squares with 4 corners coming together as opposed to the points on the bias [design of the original pattern].(http://www.shellykang.com/all-about-the-blankie)

I have a number of larger squares assembled and I wanted to see how many squares I would need. I laid some out on a folded sheet to get an idea of the size. I had thought that I would need 1280 small squares for a queen-sized blanket, but I have revised that to 1080. Still a very large number. I have knit 585 squares so far, and I have assembled 92 large squares of the 270 I'll need.

This quilting through knitting is interesting, creating the fabric and joining the pieces. I'll love it, when I eventually finish it.

New picture of J at the Farmer's Market last week: