Creative Exploration and the Road to Inspiration
- Kaitlyn Fritsch
- 13 hours ago
- 3 min read
This post is part of the TGIFF Blog hop. To see the linked up blogs, click here, or find the widget at the bottom of the post.
In February I was one of the lucky ones hanging out in Phoenix at QuiltCon, taking in the quilts, perusing the vendors, and meeting up with my quilty friends. It was sort of a reentry into the quilting world - I had a baby at the end of 2023, so most of 2024 was a wash in terms of quilting and business, since I was focused on keeping everyone alive, catching sleep where I could, and drinking coffee to make up for it when I couldn't. Sure, I'd seen the beautiful things that people were making in 2024, I just didn't have time to participate. The quilts hanging were gorgeous and inspirational (and to be entirely transparent, I did put together 2 blocks for the NJMQG's Community Quilt effort, which was hanging), but they definitely had me longing to create again.
I've found lately that lessons come to me from multiple angles - they start as an offhand comment made in a podcast, before being mentioned in a book I'm reading. Before I know it, I'm at Robert J Bosscher's Pushing Boundaries lecture, and it's highlighted for me in a slideshow presentation. That lesson this time around?
To make good art, you have to be willing to make bad art.
Start small, be less precious, figure out the way to not do it. But you have to actually do the thing and be willing to be bad at it. (Cue Hebontheweb here)
So I came home and... Proceeded to be absolutely consumed by life again for a short while. But that lesson was pinging around at the back of my mind: what did I want to do, and what was I willing to be bad at to figure it out?
When the NJMQG announced their Initial Challenge, I knew it was my opportunity to jump in and be bad at something that had been on my mind for a while. The rules of the challenge meant that my colors and block were dictated by my initials, and the quilt was a mini quilt, which kept in line with the "start small" direction from the lecture. The colors were based off of my first inital (K), so I went online and settled on Key Lime (Kona Key Lime), Kilamanjaro (Kona Charcoal), Kitsch Blue (Kona Lagoon), and Kiss Me Pink (Kona Dragon Fruit - admittedly, this one was a stretch to get a contrasting shade in there). I could choose any block that started with my last initial (F). A few years ago I tested the Winsome Windows quilt for Belle at Seams Sew Me, and the entire time I was thinking about using the same folded cathedral window technique on flying geese. There was my block starting with an F, so I made a sample.
As I was working, I realized that I actually had worked in 3 Fs, as it was a Flanged Folded Flying Geese block. Sold. Once I had proof of concept, I pulled it into my design software to figure out the math of it all - how my units could fit together, what it looked like if I changed the color of different parts of the unit, and how everything came together. In the end, my design looked something like this:
The actual assembly took a minimal amount of time, which was good because (as with many things that you do while having young children) I was trying to cram way too many things into the schedule, and ended up finishing the project at midnight the night before the guild meeting. There were some minor modifications along the way, but it turned out pretty true to the mock-up, so I was pleased!
Turns out that there wasn't actually much sucking involved, but I had to be willing to let it suck to learn the lessons to make the next one better. Having played around with the units since, I've definitely refined my technique so things lay nicer, fold and press easier, and stitch down smoother.
So today I'm encouraging you to be willing to suck. Do the experimental thing. And share a finish with the TGIFF Blog hop below so we can celebrate the gorgeous and imperfect things you're creating.