Friday, January 4, 2013

MY FIRST WALL HANGING 1990

WOW, SEEMS LIKE ONLY YESTERDAY THAT I MADE THIS LITTLE QUILT.  After going to the Quilt Expo Europo II,  with the quilters from the U.S. in 1989, I was so thrilled with quilting. I had only made one quilt block, the Ohio Star, and had used that to make a throw pillow.  When anyone on the bus asked me what kind of quilting I did, I would reply, I make quilted pillows.  I'm sure they were impressed.
The trip started in Bergen Norway, then a railroad train ride across Norway to Oslo.  We took an over night ferry to Copenhagen, Denmark.
From Copenhagen, on to Odense, Denmark, where the quilt expo was held.  Odense was also the home of Hans Christian Andersen and I fell in love with that part of the world.  After seeing "The Little Mermaid" sitting on a rock in the harbor at Copenhagen;  watching the "Ugly Ducklings" in a little stream behind his house in Odense, it was truly a dream come true.  I have loved his stories since I was a little girl, and seeing where he lived and worked and dreamed up all those wonderful stories, I felt like I was kin to him in some way.
     While we were visiting Odense, the whole city had silhouettes of him at every stop light.  He had such a wonderful profile, that I thought I had to put him on a quilt. 
    One afternoon while sitting in a park just enjoying the scenery, I met Ellie Sienkiewicz, the Baltimore Album guru.  What you must understand is that at this time in my life, I had no clue who any of these guru quilters were.  I had just started quilting, and had brought about 50 3 1/2" squares of a weird shade of yellow fabric along with me, to get everyone on the tour to sign one.  I thought it would be fun having that to make a little wall hanging when I got home.  When Elly signed my little square, she did it beautifully in script, and all decorated so pretty.  I was most impressed with this lady; never dreaming who it was until much later in my quilting career.
     Another hilarious thing that happened in Odense was that I was sitting in the lobby one evening waiting to go to dinner. The lady that I sat down by was named Bonnie, too.  We chatted for a long time and I finally asked her if she would sign one of my squares.  You know of course, it was Bonnie Lehman, the Quilters Newsletter magazine founder.  I had no clue who she was nor why everyone was so chatty with her...........duhhhhhhhhhh
      Anita Murphy was on the trip as well.....Marti Mitchell was on the trip.  They are all on this little wall hanging if you look closely.  Elna Dick was my roommate, and she would be so excited every evening to see who I had gotten to sign my little squares.  She knew a lot about quilting!
     I bought all of the fabric in Odense, and really didn't know a thing about choosing colors for a quilt. 
     I finished this little wall hanging, which happens to be my 1st one, and sent it to the Houston International Quilt Show.  They hung it in the show!!!!! I look at it now, and see the binding doesn't hang quite straight, and there are several other goofs in it, but I just love it.  In this case, ignorance was bliss, as I had no idea why everyone was so excited over my little quilt.