The Independence day seems to be a good day for me to be back on my blog. So here I am. Happy Independence Day Bulgaria! It took me some time to get used to being a mom of a pupil, which includes super early start of the day and driving, being sleep deprived and my sewing machine being neglected... To make things even more interesting I dropped my camera by some really stupid incident... but it is back working now... I am behind the Doll Quilt Swap schedule, but the quilt is ready finally. I am happy with it. I had never made such a complex quilt entirely by hand before. My first entirely handmade quilt was simpler. But wanted this one colourful and cheerful, not so stylish as the first one. I am now showing the quilt as it is a surprise package which has not reached its recipient yet. It was great pleasure making it. I did not follow precisely my partner likings. I hope it will be liked. I really love being part of Doll Quilt Swap. And I received a DQS package too. Will blog it soon. It is gorgeous!

It is a small quilt, I think it is the smallest one I have made so far. It is partly inspired by the Improve part in Project Improve. I had to make something without my machine, I needed something nice, nice to make, easy to assemble and different than what I normally would make. So it was easy to make it different - white to replace the colours, scissors to be the cutting tool, needle to replace the machine /no options really here/. I have being keeping some yo-yos for a year so I really wanted to use some of them. I like the clean and simple look of it. It appears to have some serene qualities and I do like serene style in quilts. I call it a successful experiment and have already planed some new ones to match. It is my first quilt made by hand - no single machine stitch here, nor any rotary cutting or any other "modern" help. I used Perle cotton for the quilting and did not quilted too much as I was trying to make it all as as simple as possible. I am still not sure if it would look better with some white quilting on the background. I decided not to add it to keep the texture of the ovals. The quilting is in three different shades of green. Oh, and the label is in orange /of course/.

This is truly my idea of holidays and gifts. It is what made me stop using my diploma and start full time crafting experience instead. I am so happy I can make gifts and craft, sew, quilt, plan gifts and gift lists... and pack, give and make people happy on a regular basis. If you are like me, you will be happy to see that Sew, Mama, Sew! has started a 2nd Handmade Holidays campaign this year. Click on the "Handmade Holidays" banner at  the right column of my blog, to be part of the holiday fun!

Most of the young Bulgarian women at approximately my age do not embroider, knit or crochet, few sew, some are fond of gobelin tapestries stitching. It seems that gobelins stiching is a sophisticated refined hobby /maybe because it has no practical use/ and the rest of the traditional crafts like - knitting, crocheting, embroidery and sewing - are neglected or considered "strange". Maybe because in some unconscious way they imply that you can not buy what you make, thus has to make it /you are poor/ or do not like what you can buy /you are rich, idle and pretentious/. These are just guesses meant to make you smile, actually. But I see no other explanation of this. If you live in a city and happen to knit or embroider outside of your own home today, you will be most likely considered strange. These things are considered grannies' priorities and a young modern woman is expected to drink coffee and chat instead. Well, I do not drink coffee, which is strange enough. Nice hand made home decor and fashion accessories are respected, but knitting or buying hand-knitted socks is "strange". Of course I do not care of being considered strange, but I am surprised to see that knitting /that I currently rediscovered/, which is one of the most popular crafts is not respected even by some of the yarn shop sellers in my city. How do you feel about crafting? Do you care if someone thinks you are crazy to knit when you can buy mass-produced knitted good instead? Or any other craft. Do you appreciate the art and craft mainly for the process and uniqueness or respect the practical use too?n