Four Seasons Quilt Swap

It has been a long time since I joined in with a swap of any sort. Well a couple of years anyway.

There are good things and bad about being part of swapping your talent and time. Hope remains always in a swap, until a suspicion of disappoint proves true. One of the more recent swaps I was part of proved disappointing -- but I did not give up until the swapper asigned to me started to send me junk emails, job opportunites and weird links to the point where I had to block all emails from her -- actually in all the time I have participated in swaps that was the most disappointing one ever...

Swapping quilts, fabric, tools or whatever has 99 times out of a hundred been a very good experience -- not that I have been in 100 swaps, not nearly.

10 years back, or maybe more I took part in a fun swap done through the RCTQ google group (rec.crafts.textiles.quilting) called The Baseball Swap, it was based on picking a Major League Baseball team, my team was the Arizona Diamondbacks, because my son told me they were a great new, up and coming team and I have stuck with them as "MY TEAM". I loved this swap because you "Won" a 6" square of fabric for every game your team one -- the losing team "owners" sending you a square. So if 6 people have the Atlanta Braves as their team and the Braves lost to the Diamondbacks, I would receive 6 squares, but if the Braves won the game, I would be sending out 1 square to each of the owners of the Braves. The swappers actually sent out the packs only twice a season, at the All-Star break and again at the World Series. It was a great swap!

I have been part of the Yahoo Group Quilt Swap Group and have participated in two swaps and recieved and sent two wonderfully arty quilts that still today hang on my walls, one in my bed/tv watching room, and the other in my living room, and whenever I see the artists mentioned on lists or on their own blogs, I am so happy that I was able to trade with such special artists.

Now this swap I am participating in, is giving me a very optimistic feel. The list of quilt artists is very impressive and even those I have not come across before have wonderfully interesting blogs. (There is a list with links to their blogs on the 4sqs web page -- just click on the title of this post and it will take you to the main page) The type of swap is not one I have done before -- monochromatic --- It has some interesting options to using fabric -- and I do have something in mind. I can't tell you what though, in case my assigned partner should be reading this.

The organizer of the swap has suggested that to give our partners a bit of an idea of what we like that we post it on our own blog... So especially for the ARTIST who will be making a quilt for me.

I said that I like green but need the thrill of RED... I do wear a red jacket and when I pick clothing colours it always seems to variations of red -- especially towards plum and burgundy, but also browns. The walls of my home are green, so Reds in quilts and home accessories work very well.
I try to be an artist, but most of the time, don't really understand abstract unless it is a crazy quilt format. I do like 'wonky' patterns, but also love the evenness of a good traditional block, well executed. Messiness, irritates me. I am a person who enjoys pets, having two cats and a stinky dog that I put up with everyday, but do not ever kiss! I am, I think, an independent type of person but am lazy enough to let someone else do the things that maybe I should do myself - an odd contradiction, maybe. I enjoy the 'details' of a project, probably more that the thing as a whole -- perhaps why I enjoyed my work as a bookkeeper, but didn't care if the business was in the black or red, just keeping track was the fun part.

Well, that is alot of detail, isn't it.

I hope that if you are considering taking part in a swap, that you do so if you know you can keep the promise to the others in the swap. If you know you may be facing problems or are generally a procrastinator, don't be the cause of someone being disappointed. Jump in, fulfill your promise, swaps are great fun and a wonderful way to add ART to your home.