3 November 2005

Getting back onto the horse

I'm slowly, ever so slowly getting back onto the horse with quilting. Googling my local town and nearest big city in connection with the term quilting has churned out an excellent online and offline shop (needless to say, I've already placed an order at Patchcom.de as well as a few leads on local quilting groups. The largest, The Black Forest Quilters at this time unfortunately does not accept any new non-military members, which seems to have something to do with quotas and what-not for their being accepted as an official guild. And then, the inimitable Mrs Mel pointed me in the direction of Kristin LaFlamme, who lives a lot closer to me than to most of you out there. We're actually less than two hours away from each other and I will start campaigning for a non-military personnel class of her's before she ups sticks and moves away.

But for now it seems that I will have to make do with local German quilting groups, which is just as well.

Furthermore, I've traced the next sections of my embroidery design onto paper for it to be transfered onto fabric and stitched at some stage. Because one day, this shall become a present for my mum.

I have now not done any quilting for 2 1/2 months and I am feeling the emotional effects of it. I only realised this recently but quilting - the fact that at night I do something I love that is pretty much purely hedonistic, yet creative in the literal sense of the word - has become a sort of medication to me. It helps me keep my sanity. And because it is something none of my friends or relatives (can) do, I gain a sense of accomplishment from it that is enormously beneficial to my somewhat shredded sense of self (-esteem).

Once I get the "den" (a.k.a. basement a.k.a. office) in shape, I also hope to be able to continue painting. I am full of ideas but lack the work space. How I long for my own creative space!

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