Quilter's path

Howdy... Most of you know me as a visual artist working with pencils, pens, various types of paints and sculpture. You also know me to design and build things mostly in metal and wood. So finding out that I have taken up the traditionally female dominated craft of quilting may be surprising. Yes I am learning to quilt. I wish I could say that this was like my other adventures in being creative mostly very natural with a small learning curve. NO do not be fooled by the simplistic beauty of a quilt you may have inherited or recently received as a gift. Quilting has many genres I have discovered the old school of TRADITIONAL, then a more recent movement of MODERN and lastly the ART quilt people which I feel are more fiber artists than quilters. BUT by definition from what I have seen the past year anything that involves fabric and batting with the batting being sandwiched between the fabric and then sewing thread to keep the "sandwich" together is a quilt. That is where the simplicity ends. I would say that quilting embodies all of these skills - engineer, graphic designer, historian, social worker, artist, seamstress, buyer and lastly voyeur. IT IS THE HARDEST EASY THING I HAVE EVER TRIED. kind of like poker but worse because there is a quilt left to testify to my abilities and talents. or lack there of. So with my usual over exuberance and passion for anything mainly because I am ADHD OCD and a whole lot of other acronyms I am starting down the quilters path. I have joined two guilds in the fools belief they would teach me how to quilt. Not exactly 1.) you have to have a good sewing machine of which I have two and then you really have to have some sewing know how of which I have my self taught grandma inspired years of poking around and lastly you need to have an understanding of the quilt world which I am learning. In other words do not under any situation come to the table empty handed it is a get what you give world in these guilds and there are some voracious individuals who will eat you alive. I have been digested a few times. But the talent and opportunities are boundless and certainly worth the bumps and bruises along the way. Let's just say at this point if you are not a self motivating person you may not find a lot of push from these groups but if you are self motivated and a little competitive and love to sew then dive into the fabric pit and swim with the sharks. I am having fun. I am frustrated a lot of the time but it is fun once you get the tools and a lot of cool fabrics it is all out brainstorming fun.