Wednesday, June 30, 2010

My Journal Quilt

Ok, I’m finally ready to post a pic of my year-long journal quilt project. For this quilt, I made one 6x6” journal quilt every week from my 48th birthday until my 49th (Feb. 2009 to Feb. 2010).
The quilt actually has 56 squares—52 weeks, plus 4 embroidered corner squares that read “Journal Quilt,” “Feb. 2009,” “Feb 2010,” and “My 48th Year.”

As it turns out, creating all the squares was probably the easy part. Once I had completed them, I couldn’t decide on the best way to assemble them.

I considered stitching them to a solid background in a grid. I didn’t want to do that, however, because each square has a hand-written label on the back describing the inspiration for that week’s square.
I thought about adding sashing between the rows and the columns, but I was afraid that would make the piece unbearably wonky.

Finally, I decided just to stitch them all together. Here’s what it looks like at this point:



I’m not terribly happy with it yet. I think the problem is that there is nothing to unify the squares, so it seems a little disjointed/chaotic. I’m considering adding borders to it, but I just can’t decide.

Another thought . . . I could disassemble the squares, stitch them to a background (black, maybe?), then cut away the extra background fabric so that the labels are still visible.

Ideas? Suggestions? I would like to finish this quilt before ANOTHER year has passed!

14 comments:

Kathleen Walker said...

Are you really sure you want this as a quilt? I think it would very fun if you assembled it as a book, you could attach a piece of fabric to the left of every page and then assemble as a book, you could use eyelets in the holes on each piece and then use those circular rings to assemble. Your other options are to try adding sashing strips between the units, a lot more sewing then just putting it on a backing but would leave your backs open. Just a couple of suggestions.

Kathy

Laura B. said...

I was just composing my message and I read Kathy's. Guess what? I would agree with her that the pieces would be better displayed as a book. If the whole thing is too unwieldy you could do it by season, or month. I think perhaps people would enjoy leafing through it and spend more time looking at each one. What you have done is pretty amazing and I am sure you will have lots of fun looking at them in the years to come.
Laura Brocklebank

carrie said...

A book of delights, definitely :)

Chris Predd said...

this is wonderful! I like the book idea, but if you want to keep it as a quilt, one thing to unify it is to paint over all of it with a lite wash of some color that you like, as pale blue, or even tea dye it as a whole. I don't think it looks so bad as is by the way. I guess as in life, beauty is in the eye of the beholder! Chris Predd

kathy said...

I don't see anything wrong with it as is either....it's a "sampler" quilt.

Terri Stegmiller said...

I like it as it is. It's quite an accomplishment. But I'm sure that whatever you decide to do it will be a good choice.

Jeanne Turner McBrayer said...

Congrats on finishing your journal project. I think it is exciting as is, especially since you have already done the work of sewing it together. I like the book ideas, too. Possibly you could put four to a page in a book, making it a standard scrapbook size.

Suzanne Thompson said...

I think I vote for displaying them separately; either a book or each mounted. Each square is so precious and special; looking at two at a time even is sensory overload...unless that's the point, how overwhelming a year can be. Each square is special; when shown as one they have a differnt message.

Carole said...

Hi Michelle and congrats! on getting it done. I like it as it is... but must admit my first thought was as Kathy's... a book.

If it were mine, I might try to see if I could get some colors going on a diagonal... but either way... it is a work of art in and of itself.

Dotti said...

I'm on Terri's page. I love the riot of color and motion it presents when viewed as a whole cloth!

If you went the book way it would have to be several books since these are quilties!

Barbara said...

How wonderful, well done!I love it the way it is. Its a wonderful celebration of your 48th year, there for everyone to see and for you to look back on the memories. A book can get put away and forgotten.

Alison Schwabe said...

I agree they would be best presented in some chronological book/folder format. Well doneon seeing a whe year project like this through. With hindsight some colour scheme for the whole year would have added a unifying factor. You could overdye the whole piece now if you choose to leave it together as a single quilt.

Fibra Artysta said...

Hi Michele - I just posted the winners from the thermofax screen survey comments from my blog post back in May.

Stop on by and take a look! ;-)

Lynn

laura west kong said...

I love the happy chaos, but a book would be fun too!