Quilting and Geometry - A Match Made in Heaven

When I was a young girl, my mother taught me how to sew.  She, herself, didn't really sew anything in my memory but, since she had a sewing machine and knew how to use it, I assume at one time she must have sewn in the past.  I started with easy, gathered skirts and simple blouses. My cousin, Gloria, learned with me about the same time and we made matching outfits...even though we lived on opposite sides of Chicago and didn't see each other very often.  Eventually I inherited my grandmother's old treadle machine and thoroughly enjoyed sewing on it but needles were hard to find and it eventually got relegated to the garage.  I'll never forget my pride in purchasing a new machine with some of the first paychecks I ever received.  Sewing was that important to me.   I sewed most of my clothing for many years, including my maternity clothes.  Unfortunately, when children came along my sewing machine saw less and less use.

As a teen, I was utterly fascinated with geometry class.  While many in the class just didn't seem to be able to grasp the idea of all those theorems, they made perfect sense to me.  I loved drawing shapes using my compass and protractor and discovering that different shapes could be drawn and put together to create new shapes and designs.  It was fun!  Hadn't a clue at that time what a quilt was or anything about it but there is no doubt in my mind that this was actually the basis of my love of quilting. 

When I actually discovered quilting, I wasn't daunted by what appeared to be complicated patterns.  I just dove into them and started sewing.  It made perfect sense to me that seams had to be accurate or how else would all those shapes fit together properly. 

 



One of my favorite early quilts was this pineapple quilt. Two of the borders hadn't been sewn on yet when this picture was taken but it's the only picture I have.  Today, if I had to duplicate it, I probably would paper piece it for accuracy but when I made it, I sewed on a strip, cut the angle, sewed on the next strip, cut the angle etc. for what seemed forever.  Today I realize how easily that could have gotten askew but everything seemed to fit together fine so I must have been extremely accurate.  I kept it for several years and then gave it to my good friend, Batty, who helped me through a tough recuperation after double knee replacement surgery.  She was delighted and I was thankful.