Gwen Marston's "Liberated Stars"

I've wanted to take a class from Gwen Marston for years. My Tangled Threads friend Kim has spent several days in Gwen's classes and said she was the best. So I was thrilled that Kim and I were able to take her "Liberated Stars" class in Sisters. Kim's right - what a down-to-earth, nice-as-can-be lady! She has a wonderful way of immediately making you feel like her close friend. I'd take another class from her in a minute - if you ever get the chance I highly recommend you do it. I'd love to attend her Michigan retreat sometime.

This was a very fun class - something I've wanted to try ever since I bought her "Liberated Quiltmaking" book years ago. I knew it would be a challenge as I've always been so anal about seams matching, points, etc. What I learned is one can go too far the other way. Instead of just putting down fabric and stitching, sometimes I tried too hard to liberate points. At least one is liberated way too much - notice the star point that is hardly there? That block will be relegated to the orphan drawer. When I make more I'm going to try to just let it happen instead of over thinking the process.


My friend Kim hard at work.


It was lots of fun to just sew without thinking a lot - the only thinking involved dividing by 3 to determine how to make different size blocks. Not necessarily an easy math problem when trying to figure out the size of a little star to fit into the middle of a big star!

I've pictures of Gwen's quilts in her books, but seeing them in person is always so much better. I love the one with the appliquéd border. Good news for those of you who don't have the Liberated Quilts book and can't afford the sky high price of second hand. Gwen has gotten her publisher to agree to a new edition. It'll be a new book, with much of the same info as the old book plus additions. The "Liberated Baskets" quilt I've pictured will be in that book.