It feels good to feel inspired

This fabulous mask quilt was made by Dale Fleming, the author of "Pieced Curves So Simple." Dale was the guest speaker at our guild meeting yesterday, and I was really glad I was there to hear her talk.

(I have to digress to say that for a bunch of reasons, I rarely made it to a guild meeting over the last year or so. I swear, the universe aligned to throw me curve balls on the third Thursday of each month -- a sudden work emergency, a necessary appointment with that as the only available day, a child home sick. I have missed attending guild and seeing those wonderful folks and enjoying show and tell and I am determined to improve my attendance record this year!)

Anyway. Dale's talk was terrific. She talked about getting from inspiration to quilt, with particular emphasis on how far from the original image or idea a resulting quilt can be. She even played us a favorite song of hers and then showed us the quilt that resulted from that inspiration. She has a great sense of humor, and her presentation brought a lot of laughs from the audience.

She also walked through her simple curved piecing technique, which she's demonstrated on Simply Quilts and which is the subject of her book. (She's doing a workshop for the guild today and some friends of mine are taking it...I'm looking forward to seeing what they do.) The technique sure looks easy -- it mainly involves using freezer paper as a template and glueing, then sewing on the resulting fold line afterwards. I've gotten the itch to give it a try and just play, which is always a good feeling.

The excited and inspired feeling I left with (and have been lacking of late) reminded me why it's good to go to guild. There's nothing like hanging out with other quilters.