Binding my time

It's our 100th post!!!

To celebrate this momentous occasion I thought I would write about something really special.  Something really near and dear to the quilters' heart.

Binding.

That's right.  Binding.

I told you it was special.


Recently, I felt as though I unlocked the secret of binding.  In my first two projects I fumbled through this finishing technique, never really feeling I was doing it right.  In hindsight, anything that kept the edges together and neat would be considered 'right.'  But at the time I felt very aware of there being a proper way to bind and  that I wasn't quite getting it right.

With the t-shirts, I was confident I could figure it out just by studying the machine-made quilt on my bed and combining that with my new-found skills, after piecing together both the front and back panels.

Luckily, before I dove in, I consulted the hive mind that is the internet quilting community, and its many tutorials, and saved myself from what was on course to being an 'interesting' improvised solution.  I shutter to think of the melt-down I so nearly succumbed to had I went about my 'confident' business.

With that particular project, and projects since, I have harboured a bit of a stubborn streak about taking advice from other quilters or leaning on tutorials from popular blogs.

While binding Pruin's quilt, I had a bit of an embarrassing epiphany.  One of the reasons we began this blogging adventure in particular was to utilize the collective knowledge of the quilting community.  To experiment and document how this particular knowledge and skill set is passed along and how it mutates with each use.

I wanted to collect stories about how one learned to quilt, with the expectation that within that learning process would always be a link to the skill being passed along tangibly in some way.  Yet, I was refusing to allow myself to learn from others' experience and generosity, be it virtual or tangible.  I was going to figure it out myself, dammit.

But with Pruin's quilt, I wanted to do it 'right.'  I was not satisfied with my earlier attempts and I didn't want to but that frustration and doubt into this particular quilt.  There was enough of those emotions coming in the future.  I wanted this piece to be a bit about my growing confidence as a quilter as well as my ability to compromise.  I had let myself use store bought fabric, why not let myself use pre-packaged knowledge in the form of a tutorial as well.

I sought out five different tutorials online and read them each numerous times.  Comparing the techniques, noticing how each quilter approached corners and finishing a bit differently.  Critiquing the teaching quality of the accompanying text and photos.  Finally combining the wisdom of two tutorials, I bound Pruin's quilt.  And while my hand-finishing mojo still takes at least a half length to get going, I felt very satisfied and proud of the result.

I hadn't reinvented the wheel. I reached out to the community and expertise to learn a new skill.  But I also allowed myself to mutate that skill, or at least the learning of it, a tiny bit by combining the five tutorials' advice with my own confidence and skill level.

The satisfaction I get from Pruin's quilt, despite its uneven joins and quilting (which visually is a step back compared to my t-shirts), is not just from the simple fact that I completed it but also because I completed it with the assistance of my quilting community.  I learned something and that story and skill is now as much a part of the quilt as the story of shirts of which it is made.


Do you remember your first binding?