What a Find!

A few years ago I visited my local Thrift Shop. I don't usually shop at Thrift Shops but I did once find an older mechanical Bernina sewing machine for $30! It is probably the only Bernina I will ever afford to own. So I was hopeful that I might find another vintage machine but there were none to be had. I wandered over to the grab bags of fabric (huge bags for $3) and discovered that one had several pieces of Lonni Rossi designed Japanese fabric in it. So I brought it home and discovered there were 24 fat quarters of Lonni's fabric in the bag. There were also several pieces of Japanese silk lame. At quilt store prices I would have paid about over $75 for it. It has been taking up space in my stash for three years. Two summers ago, a friend gave me a panel of a Japanese geisha that she thought I could use for this planned quilt. Or maybe it was the gentle nudge to get moving on it!

I was waiting for the perfect pattern to come along before I cut into any of the fabric. Well, I did find the pattern and I sewed it up last Fall. I put the Geisha on the back (that may now become the front) and echo stitched around her, then filled in the remaining background with spiral quilting. I used Sulky monofilament thread on the Geisha side and metallic Sulky thread (in the bobbin) on the pieced side. I put the binding on and finished handsewing it down while listening to the football games yesterday.

When I showed it to my husband he asked what the Japanese symbols meant. Duh!! What a good question so I wrote to Cyndi, a local art quilt teacher ( and my first Art Quilt teacher) who has worked with Lonni in the past. She suggested I write to Lonni, herself, and ask the question. So I went to her website ( http://www.lonnirossi.com/about-us ) and sent a note to her staff. Within an hour I received a response and I am in process of sending pictures so they can identify the fabric (Lonni has made lots of fabrics with Kanji on them). In the meantime, I think I will name this quilt "Joy" because it has been joyful for me to make this quilt from beginning to end. And now more joy that it is completed. Now I can only hope that one of those symbols on the quilt is the symbol for JOY.

The pics were taken before the binding was completed, but thought you might like to see them anyway.