{"id":20596,"date":"2015-02-12T00:01:51","date_gmt":"2015-02-12T08:01:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/barbarafalconernewhall.com\/?p=20596"},"modified":"2015-02-12T00:01:51","modified_gmt":"2015-02-12T08:01:51","slug":"a-crazy-making-crazy-quilt-finished-at-last","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/a-crazy-making-crazy-quilt-finished-at-last\/","title":{"rendered":"A Crazy-Making Crazy Quilt — Finished at Last"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"A<\/a>
The crazy quilt\u00a0top\u00a0I’d made of calico as a wedding gift back in 1971 was riddled with ripples. In hopes of making it lie flat\u00a0I cut\u00a0away a section. Photo by Barbara Newhall<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

By Barbara Falconer Newhall<\/em><\/p>\n

There I was, at Sue Mary Fox\u2019s sewing studio in Berkeley. Pinned to\u00a0her wall\u00a0was the crazy-making crazy quilt that I had begun–but never finished–back in 1971. It was to be a wedding gift for my brother and his bride.<\/p>\n

Forty-some years later, I\u00a0decided it was time to finish<\/a> the darned thing. It had\u00a0languished in a drawer for decades; it was time to put it out of its misery. It was time to put myself out of my misery and guilt.<\/p>\n

At home a few days earlier I\u00a0had\u00a0started by spreading the quilt out on the floor and cutting away<\/p>\n

\"Multicolored<\/a>
I cut away some more pieces, but it still didn’t lie flat, and now I had a gangly, odd-shaped\u00a0quilt top on my hands. Photo by Barbara Newhall<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

sections\u00a0of the pieced quilt top in hopes of eliminating\u00a0the ripples and waves I\u2019d sewn into it so many years ago\u2014so that it could lie flat at last. Then I took the results, along with all my scraps and pieces, over to Sue Mary’s studio<\/a> where she pinned it to a wall.<\/p>\n

The whittled-down\u00a0quilt top\u00a0was pretty enough, but the shape was frightful \u2013 long, narrow and sprawling. What would anyone\u00a0do with such an oddball, seven-by-four-foot quilt, Sue Mary\u00a0wanted to know.<\/p>\n

I concluded that it would be a kindness to spare my brother and sister-in-law\u00a0such a gift, so we turned our attention to one of the\u00a0sections\u00a0I’d\u00a0cut away from\u00a0the main piece. It\u00a0had a nice rectangular shape. It was pretty, and small enough that my brother and his wife\u00a0might actually like having it in their house. They could use it as\u00a0a wall hanging, they could toss it over\u00a0the back of a sofa, they could put it on the floor as a play space for a visiting grandchild<\/a>. And if they weren’t crazy about it, it\u00a0would fit nicely in a drawer.<\/p>\n

But, wait \u00a0—\u00a0a grandchild<\/a>?\u00a0What a thought. I took\u00a0the leftover\u00a0calico pieces home and tucked them back into their drawer. Should a grandchild happen my way some day, I’m ready. With\u00a0Sue Mary’s help, I’ll\u00a0be able to get\u00a0a baby blanket\u00a0pulled together in no time. Well before the kid turns forty.<\/p>\n

Read all about the birth of those baby quilts at “The Baby Quilts Are Ready. Now All We Need Are the Babies.”<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

If you like this story, you might enjoy “The Berkeley Potters Guild –Three Artists”<\/a>\u00a0and “Shopping at the Sawtooth Building.”<\/a> \u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

\"Sue<\/a>
I took the project to\u00a0Sue Mary Fox’s studio in Berkeley. There she mounted a\u00a0smaller, more attractive section of the quilt onto her long arm sewing machine<\/a>, along with black batting and a red calico backing.\u00a0Then, in video below, she used a freehand loop-de-loop pattern to quilt the three layers together.\u00a0Photo and video by Barbara Falconer<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n