We’re writing a book!

Hello and welcome back! Hope your weekend was lovely. Mine was really, really nice. We had an adventure – that’s what we call short trips to interesting places in our house – out to Washington-on-the-Brazos, the site where the Declaration of Texas’ Independence was signed. The site is a very well maintained State park.  We had a lovely 2 mile hike amongst fields of wildflowers. And, afterward, we had a picnic. All-in-all, it was a gorgeous day! These are my sons, posing in front of a tree that has been growing at Washington-on-the-Brazos since around the time of the signing of the Texas Declaration of Independence. Not only is it very old but it is of a very unique variety from Mexico, thought to be brought to Texas via the trade route that used to run right through this site. The La Bahia Pecan so was beautiful to behold. I think we all felt humbled and lucky to stand beneath it. And speaking of historic things, I’d like to get to the main subject of this post. My husband has always been so incredibly supportive of my quilting.  Two or so weeks ago, I was grousing about quilt block names being so random – by this I mean, everyone seems to have their own name for blocks – and, often, it’s tough to tell where the block originated.  I am currently also working on a degree in American History so I am no stranger to research.  Further, because of my profound love of history, I like to know the story behind the blocks or quilts I work with. This has led to untold amounts of frustration because that sort of information – at least from what I can tell – has not really ever been compiled on quilts. A good example of this multi-name confusion would be the quilt software I use calls a specific block one thing but, when I go to research the block name it gives me online the block almost never appears in the same configuration or under the same name.  And while the online catalogue of antique quilts is helpful but it’s sometimes really tough to find what you’re looking for there as well. In essence, you have to know the name of the block you’re looking for – by region sometimes – to find information about it. This is about the point Bud Abbott and Lou Costello pop into my head shouting, “Third base!” While there are great books out there that show how to draft blocks or give a little information on where they found the name of said block, I don’t really feel there’s a resource out there that tells the story of our glorous and beautiful art.   Of course, I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention Jinny Beyer’s The Quilter’s Album of Patchwork Patterns – which is a truly great resource for any quilter on multiple levels and contains 4,050 patchwork patterns – but, while I feel Jinny’s work has been invaluable, I want to know more. So, of course, as I explain my frustration to him, my husband simply replies, “Well, why don’t we just sit down and write it ourselves?” And that, long story short, is just what we’re doing. It’ll be a huge endeavor but in the end I think it will be quite rewarding and I am really looking forward to it. Unfortunately, I can’t give you much more information on our project, as we’re in the very early stages, but I thought I’d at least announce that we’re working on a book! Well, that’s all I have to share today. See you tomorrow with some project updates!