I was inspired to make this little (10×8) OctoQuilt for Collage Mania after seeing a drawing made by my stepson.   He was making designs that he thought would be good for skateboards!

I fused the octopus body and then fused the legs and the seaweed after weaving them together.  I outlined the octopus parts with a bright orange blanket stitch and ran a satin stitch along the length of the seaweed.   I stitched his eyes with a fat satin stitch.

To give it a quilted finish, I used two shades of blue metallic thread in free-motion waves.  The metallic thread was almost the end of me - it must have broke at least 20 times.  I have the special needles with the larger eye, but for this project they didn’t help at all.

To finish it, I put on a mitered binding and hand-stitched the back side.  All that is left to do is a label, and I’m looking online for a good design for that right now!

I’ve been sewing since I was a little girl.  Like a lot little girls, I started sewing doll clothes on my mom’s machine while she would sew matching outfits for my sister and me.  (I’m the tall one.  Or, I used to be.  Since I’m older, I’m starting to shrink faster).

I made my first quilt about ten years ago after finding a pattern in Women’s Day magazine for the Trip Around the World Quilt that you could finish in eight hours.  It took me more than eight hours, but not that much more.  I made four of them in quick succession.  I didn’t know the first thing about fabrics, and several of the quilts have since fallen apart.  They were tied, not quilted.  I had no idea how to make a binding so I just brought the backing to the top and folded it over.  I am pretty sure I didn’t iron a single block.

I didn’t quilt for a long time after that.  I had friends who quilted and it never occurred to me to ask them about it.  I simply was not in the least bit interested.  I took up machine embroidery and loved it.  I even bought a “Quilter’s Embroidery Edition” Bernina but never thought about quilting.

As an aside, the short person in the photo turned out to be a brilliant fiber artist, and makes the most beautiful batiks I’ve ever seen.  She doesn’t sell them commercially yet, but I’m working on her!

In a moment of weakness, I joined the Crafter’s Choice Book Club.  All of a sudden I was getting two or three really big books on things like crocheting and quilting because I kept forgetting to tell them not to send me the automatic selections.  I sent some of the books back, but found a box from them in my closet a few months ago.  Inside were these two books:

I still didn’t take the bait right away. I let them sit on a shelf for a few weeks.  One night I picked up Quilter’s Catalog and that was it.  I read 80% of the book, which is crazy because it’s meant to be a resource, not something you just sit and read.  Then I devoured Quilt with Confidence and then I went to the library and rented some DVD’s about quilting and then I went to Goodwill and found some old books on quilting.

Next thing you know, I was at the fabric store, picking things for some practice Churn Dash blocks.    I was hooked!!