Seeing Reds

Mom's favorite color was red. She had an amazing collection of red nylon night gowns because Dad knew he'd never go wrong giving her some lingerie that was red and frilly. The depth of her red passion recently came to light when I finally opened a drawer in my studio, took out plastic-wrapped bundles of half-made quilts that had been shipped to me after her death, and unwrapped the parcels. One quilt top was complete. And it's all reds. Reds and animal prints in a Nine Patch pattern.

One of my siblings will eventually get Mom's red quilt--I'll border it and have it professionally quilted.

Hunting the animal prints was a joy--for her. When she'd come for a visit, she'd get out the scissors and ransack my stash and occasionally hold up an animal print piece and sweetly ask, "Can I get a little piece of this?" "Of course, Mom-" I'd answer, never thinking about her peculiar way of saying 'a little piece' might be a tad odd. After she left, I'd find the damning evidence. Focused entirely on snipping the desired 'little piece' she'd leave my stash with some Swiss cheese-style holes.

Exhibit #1.

Her affection for animal fabrics made for little cartoon-like touches in the Nine Patch quilt.These keep you looking at the quilt far longer than if it had been purely an exercise in geometry. Exhibit #2.

From time to time I indulge my Red side too. Recently I made this quilt as a present to my friend Fran. She--bless her--had hand-knitted a rather complex sweater, all in blue, white, and black, that mimicked Japanese stitching. It was a fair swap.

I wrote about Fran's quilt in a former post (Still Verboten) but here she is with her quilt and dog-friend Shayna.

Fran didn't know she was going to get a quilt from me. She was 18 months knitting this beautiful sweater. I think I got the best part of the deal!

Red is still on my mind. Just completed the Phone Book Quilt that I demo'd in the Craftsy Scrap Quilting video (and it's on sale now for $19.95!). The Phone Book Quilt is a strip-pieced quilt sewn over paper squares--the pages I ripped from an old phone book.

I think I'd rather quilt than eat. This was so much fun. Machine quilting 'in the ditch' along the block seams and then Big Stitch with #12 black perle.

At any rate, I'd always choose quilting over housework.
Here's what hangs over the kitchen sink at home.