There’s always a story in my quilts.
My friend Steve read of the passing of Alex Anderson, Jr., the creator of Rocky and Bullwinkle (a cartoon from the 1960’s), just before boarding a plan home from a business trip. He drew this picture as a memorial to Mr. Anderson. He drew it quickly, without any visual prompt – on his phone!

I dyed the fabric this past weekend and I’m pretty pleased with the results because blues are hard.
More to come…

Symmetry note: Alex Anderson is also the name of a very ALIVE quilting personality, who I love. And she is also partners with my favorite guy, Ricky Tims, on The Quilting Show. Much more to come about that, too…
 

After reading this, one might be inclined to think I should be a research subject. But I I’m afraid I’m way less unique than I imagine.

I’m a quilter and that means that I am odd, in the sense that I spend many hours cutting and stitching bits of colored cloth. It’s a strange pursuit that is lonely at times. So I’ve named the machines which have kept me company through the years…

My first named sewing machine, a shiny new Bernina bought in 1993 against the better judgment of my entire family, is Tilly. I named her after the dress figure that modeled my mother’s creations in the upstairs spare-bedroom-turned-sewing-room of my childhood home. My Tilly began her career in my first (basement) studio, tucked there as an enticing escape from an ear-infection-plagued toddler.
For my birthday three years ago, I was given a new Bernina. I christened her Cleopatra (for reasons that I’m sure Bernina wouldn’t like published) because she was a hateful machine at first. I thought Cleopatra and I had worked things out on a recent drive cross country to Colorado, where we spent a lovely week sewing and creating at a Ricky Tims retreat. But she came back more arrogant and unmanageable. My new friend Celeste (a real person at my local quilt shop, Thimble Pleasures), moderated our disagreement and transformed the insufferable Cleopatra to pal Cleo by enlisting her into quilt shop boot camp. We’ll see how Cleo fares now that she’s back; personally, I’m still having trust issues but…
So when my new long arm miracle machine arrived amidst all this dysfunctional middle-school-like drama, I thought our design group could use some diversity. Welcome Quentin Maurice (Quilting Machine, get it?), 14 feet of solidly engineered, computerized genius, humming wonder machine. He is my smooth operator and he almost fills his designated spot in the studio. To my friends, he’s affectionately (and not weirdly) referred to as my new husband, but really, he’s a kept man. And he shares his space with Fritz Carlos (Fabric Cutter) and my bicycle, Bernice, who sweeps me around town. I probably should save my explanation about Ali-Honda for another day.
Okay, perhaps I do need to sign up for that research study…