At least I've started

Tuesday night was our sixth session of the Civil War and Centennial quilt class. If I were keeping up I would have at least 24 blocks made. Instead I have three prepared and one finished. That's OK - it isn't a race. Last night I prepared freezer paper templates for the rest of the blocks we've received in our kits, so I'm all ready to prep more blocks.

Here is the block I've finished. This one makes me smile ever time I see it. Before I did the reverse appliqué in the center it looked to me like a fat, very moldy cauliflower. Now it looks like an alien. It's a toss up as to whether it's a space alien from Close Encounters of the Third Kind or an underwater alien from The Abyss. No matter - it still makes me smile. Some of the ladies in the class found it very creepy and are making it without it's "eyes". Eileen put this pattern in the chapter with leaves, and called it an oak leaf. Really makes me wonder if that was the intention of the maker 150 years ago - or did she have a "close encounter" of her own? If so, the alien must have been suffering from a lazy right eyelid!

Quite a few of you asked how you could get the pattern for this quilt. Unfortunately it isn't available - at least at this time. We are just so incredibly lucky to have Eileen living here in Vancouver so we can take advantage of her classes. Each class is either 11 or 12 sessions long, and are taught on a monthly basis throughout the year. As part of our class fee, we receive a packet each month, wrapped in brown paper and string, that contains both the monthly historical information about the time period as well as the patterns for each month. It also contains a letter from an "ancestor", a post card depicting something from the time period, and a selection of reproduction fabrics appropriate to the era we are studying. One of the goals of each class is that we learn to identify fabrics from the period. With this in mind, we can each bring a stack of fabrics to each class, and then watch and listen to Eileen as she identifies the appropriate era for each fabric in the class. The patterns we receive are drawn and/or drafted from antiques in Eileen's collections, which we get to examine during the class. By the end of each class we have one or two huge notebooks of information and patterns. I've already filled one 4" ring binder with the first six lessons, so I need to get another before the next class.

Eileen hopes to have the classes available by mail order eventually, but must wait on her husband who does their still-under-construction website. You might be interested in her book on dating fabrics, which continues to be one of the best selling books AQS has ever published. (No, I'm not her publicity person - just a very happy student of hers LOL!) Here is a link: Dating Fabrics.