Connecting With Our Ancestors - Quilting By Hand - with Martha Keagle
Even if you don't plan to incorporate hand quilting into your regular sewing practice it will open your eyes to see and feel the process that was used by our ancestors to make quilts. Recently, this technique (a rocking stitch in a flat frame) has been added to the Red List of Endangered Crafts by the Heritage Crafts Association. As this skill continues to drop out of circulation you will be doing a small part of keeping this skill alive just by having some knowledge of the history and process.
While the thought of hand quilting is daunting to some, once the simple technique is mastered, it's quite relaxing, and when performed properly, is not taxing for most hands. In the class you will learn how the right tools (fabric, batting, needles, thread, thimbles and quilting hoops/frames) all contribute to small even stitches.
The class kit (additional fee of $16.00 to be paid in CASH to the instructor. Please put it in an envelope with your name on it.) will include all needed fabric,
batting, hand quilting thread, hand quilting needles, Dritz Soft Comfort thimbles, and a notebook with detailed instructions and illustrations.
A good fitting thimble is essential to hand quilting, so if you have a thimble you like, bring it to class (plastic thimbles will be included in your kit, and are fine for most beginners, but a heavy, well-fitting metal thimble is ultimately needed to if you want to hand quilt seriously).
A good quilting hoop (not an embroidery hoop) is also needed for most hand quilting. If you have one, bring it to class as well. The instructor will have a number of styles of lap hoops for you to try and borrow during the class.
Participants will choose from a number of designs, but come early for the best selection.
Basic sewing supplies to bring with you:
· Small sharp scissors for cutting thread
· Paper and pen or pencil for note taking
| Instructor: | Martha Keagle |
| Instructor Bio: | This is the third of three standalone classes on the traditional hand techniques involved in quilt making (needle turn appliqué, hand piecing, and hand quilting). A scientist by training, your instructor taught medical genetics, cancer genetics, and the ethics of human genetics at the University of Connecticut for 26 years ,and was recipient of the first of an annual Outstanding Educators Award given by the Foundation for Genetic Technology and the Association of Genetic Technology. Handwork has been her passion beginning at age 4, and she turned her attention to quilting during the Great Quilt Revival around the time of the American Bicentennial. Now retired, she devotes her time to perfecting her hand work and developing her creativity. She is an award winning, published quilter with decades of experience. Her works have appeared at the Vermont Quilt Festival, The New England Quilt Museum, and the Houston International Quilt Festival, and in national quilt magazines. In her classes you will learn how our fore-mothers made their quilts. No special rulers, seam-rippers, rotary cutters, or sewing machines required. Hand work is eminently portable meaning you can use “found time” (while traveling, in hotel rooms, in waiting rooms, at home in your living room - not shut away in your sewing room, etc.) to create your quilt tops. |
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