CRAFTS WITH ANASTASIA--THE BENEFITS OF QUILTING

photo by Misocrazy

Joseph Rodriguez writes about hobbies and arts that help with stress relief. His recent work is on earning an online psychology degree.—AP

A Creative Craft: How to Discover the Benefits of Quilting

Making a quilt is more than just making a bed covering to keep you warm at night. It’s about expressing yourself through the art of sewing. Quilting is an inspirational and creative craft that allows you to create wall art, comfort a sick child or adult, travel and bond with other quilt makers, create a source of income and more. Discover the joys and benefits of quilting by looking at the sewing craft through the eyes of adventure.

Wall Art

Express your own individual taste by creating a quilt to hang on the wall of your home. A handmade quilt can be made any size and any color to perfectly fit into your unique living space. A full size quilt often is the perfect solution to add color and texture to the large, open wall space in homes with high vaulted ceilings. Mini-quilts can be handcrafted to tell a family story, and/or matted and framed to become a priceless heirloom. When friends come to your home and see your unique wall art, they will be requesting their own unique pieces and a business can be born.

Comfort the Sick

A personal touch of a hand-crafted lap quilt will bring comfort and warmth to a sick child or adult. A medium sized quilt, just right to fit over the top of a hospital bed or across the lap of someone who is ailing, will benefit both the giver and receiver. Taking your time to create a unique quilt for someone who is sick will minister to both you and the recipient on many different levels.

A handmade quilt gift does not have to be reserved for the sick only but would also make an outstanding gift on many occasions. A wedding gift, baby shower gift or as something unique to give to a college-bound teen. A quilt can be made to suit the recipients, the occasion and still allow the creator to express themselves through their sewing talents.

Travel and Bond

Quilt shows and workshops occur regularly all across the U.S. and are usually open to the public. Quilt makers can and should travel to various venues, near or far, and meet like-minded seamstresses and form bonds of friendships. These events allow for displaying and selling your handmade quilt items, learning new sewing techniques and gaining new ideas for future projects. You never know who you might meet at such an event and a new business venture could be formed along with a new friendship.

Stress Relief

Immersing yourself in the quilt-making process is therapeutic. Shopping for fabric, selecting the design, cutting and sewing, the whole creative process keeps the mind and body active while relieving stress. Quilting can be done seated or standing, so no matter what fitness level you’re at (or hope to be at), you can adjust to doing most of the work in whatever way suits you.

Creative Covering

Quilts aren't only for covering beds—you can cover a multitude of household objects with quilts to make a decorating statement. A couch back, chair, ottoman or table top can easily be covered with a quilt. Cover a window, shower curtain liner or create a room divider with a lovely quilt. Look around your home for creative and inspirational ways to use quilts, and you'll never be left bored or wanting for more.

DECORATING WITH JEANIE -- GUEST DECORATOR AND AUTHOR LEA WAIT

Maine Author Lea Wait writes the Agatha-nominated Shadows Antique Print series, (Shadows at the Fair, Shadows on the Coast of Maine, Shadows on the Ivy, Shadows at the Spring Show, and Shadows of a Down East Summer) and historical novels for young people. Today she visits Killer Crafts & Crafty Killers with some great tips for decorating the walls of your home. Visit Lea at her website for more information about her and her books.  -- AP   

Any decorating magazine will give you advice on wall colors, furniture styles, carpets versus rugs, and what window treatments to use. 

Seldom mentioned, although always pictured in the rooms displayed as examples, are the paintings and prints on the walls.  Occasionally, especially when they appear in particularly unusual arrangements or frames, they are footnotes. But, generally, you are left on your own to find the perfect pictures for your walls.

So, let me give you a little advice. First, my credentials: since 1977, either part-time or full-time, I’ve been an antique print dealer. My mother was an artist; my husband is a photographer and artist. So I’ve lived with art all of my life. I buy it, I sell it, and I know how to hang it. And I can teach you enough, even in this short article, to get you started toward making the art on your walls define you as a smart, classy, intelligent person with impeccable taste.

First, here are the things you should never, ever buy or hang on your walls:

1. Art from a chain store. This includes the bin art at a photography or framing store. 

2. Any frame made of plastic or glass.

3. A reproduction of any kind, unless you are under 25 and it is a museum shop poster.

    4. Art that matches your couch or drapes.

5. Any art that you hate, for any reason.

6. Religious art – unless you are very religious, and you are going to hang it in a private part of the house. (I’m not anti-religious, and I’m also assuming your religious art is not a Leonardo da Vince or another of the great masters. If it is, pardon me. You may hang it in your dining room.)

7. Any art that is “cute.” Cute is not classy.

OK. Now, what are you going to hang? 

You have three choices. The first choice is to hang things which are not, officially, art, but which become artistic when hung together as a collection . A group of fly rods, antique or modern (but the older the better). A half dozen decorative plates. (Not with Hummels on them. Perhaps all blue and white, or brown and white.)  A collection of framed campaign buttons. You get the idea. Something that is distinctive, interesting, and that no one else will have on their wall, framed and hung well.

The second choice is to hang paintings. Paintings are generally expensive, but that doesn’t mean having your own gallery of oils or water colors is impossible. Look for paintings you love while you’re on vacation. Look at yard sales. Look at flea markets, at auctions, at antique shows. You may well have to re-frame your treasures, but they’ll be worth it if you love them. Don’t buy something assuming you’ll make a fortune. Chances are you won’t.  Keep in mind the basics: Signed paintings are worth more than unsigned. Damaged paintings can be acquired for very little, but repairs can be expensive. (Cleaning, not so much.)

You can acquire a group of, say, small 19^th century unsigned paintings of flowers and fruit (popular subjects for ladies to paint) for perhaps $50 each. Hang them as a collection and your home has a cachet like no other. Plus – you’ll have had the fun of the chase.

And as for prints, your third option: they’re perhaps the easiest to find. Check antique print dealers, “paper shows,” antique shows, and, again, flea markets, and auctions. Nineteenth and early 20^th century prints were often bound in books, so antiquarian book dealers should be on your list. Prints of astronomy, flowers, birds, shells … they’re often the ones you see in those perfect room settings in magazines, all matted and framed.

And if you’d like to know more about antique prints, and finding them, have I got a mystery series for you! My Shadows Antique Mystery Series, starring antique print dealer Maggie Summer, follows her through the world of antique print buying, selling, and collecting, as well as solving murders (not always a part of that business.)  Each chapter begins with a description of a print and its value.  Read all 5 books in the series – and you can not only decorate your walls – you can talk about them with expertise!

Great tips, Lea! Thanks so much for joining us today. Readers, have any of you decorated your walls with unique items? Let’s hear from you. -- AP