Tuesday, February 24, 2009

Quilting With Rosie

There is an old fireplace in my sewing room. I am not sure what the status of it is; the previous owner used it a lot, but we haven't tried. It is a very shallow fireplace, originally built for burning coal, so it would be hard to use without making quite a mess, and given that it is in the sewing room, I am not much interested in using it. When we moved in, there was an ugly piece of black fabric in front of it.
I first saw Rosie the Quilter when Michelle and I were at Paducah in 2007. Some folks were selling T-shirts with her image and of course I had to have one. Unfortunately, the heavy plastic on the T-shirt made it too hot for me so I gave it to Michelle - who at least for now, isn't quite as hot blooded as I am! I later found this wonderful Rosie fabric which seemed to be just right for the sewing room. Doesn't the quilt look perfect behind Jesse, who clearly also likes my sewing room? The quilt is about 36" square. I machine pieced it at a January 2009, quilt retreat at Kanuga and hand quilted it.It is ironic that this quilt - which I made specifically to cover the fireplace - actually caught on fire while I was working on it! We had an awful ice storm here in late January and were without power for almost a week. When I finally moved back in, the house was, naturally very cold. So while it was heating up, I lit some candles. One of them was way too close to where I was hand quilting Rosie - something I didn't realize until it was too late. When I suddenly felt too hot and realized the quilt was on fire - there were literally flames in it! - I threw it to the floor and stamped on it. Fortunately, the damage was limited:
But I did have to chop off about 2 inches along one side. In order that it wouldn't look too lopsided, I also chopped some off the other side.

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