The Making of a Bookshelf Quilt: Planning Stage

Reading is my number one hobby, but a close second would have to be sewing. Specifically quilting. I’ve been making quilts for close to 25 years now. I started (doing everything by hand – I was terrified of sewing machines) when I was a teenager (don’t you dare start doing the math on that!), and I spent nearly 15 years doing it as a job. My mom opened a quilt shop when my oldest child (now 20) was still crawling. I loved that shop. My husband’s job moved us across the country about 14 years ago, but I still quilted for her and professionally for others, published patterns and books, and spent most of my time if not working on quilts, thinking about them. Everything I owned was covered in little threads.

My mom closed her shop about 5 years ago, and my professional quilting life pretty much ended then as well. Then 4 years ago I found out I was pregnant with our little monkey and I haven’t sewn a stitch since then. Mostly it’s been a time issue, but I also think I got burnt out.

A quilt I made for my oldest child about 7 years ago. It’s one of the ones I’m most fond of.

Lately I’ve been itching to get back at my sewing machine (I’m no longer afraid of them). This time, though, I want to make a Bookshelf Quilt. Have you seen these? They’re spectacular. There are many different varieties, and I have debated about what sort to attempt.

The one above is gorgeous, no question. But I’m not sure the very well matching colors really represent my actual shelves. They don’t have to, I suppose, but I think I want something that’s more personal.

I have lots of thoughts about this one. It’s lovely, and I could see doing this one for Monkey’s room using bright prints that represent his favorite things (mostly dump trucks and cheese). But I think I want more of a shelf look.

This one is definitely tempting. I love Harry Potter more than is probably healthy. And I do think he needs to be represented on my shelves. But I want other stuff on there, too.

This is another that is seriously pretty. I love how she uses the selvage (the edge of the fabric that usually displays the fabric name and manufacturer along with color codes) as titles. But after looking at all of these, I think I’ve decided I want titles of my favorite books on my shelves. So, my plan is something similar to this shelf, BUT I am going to embroider the titles of my favorite books on the spines. I bought a graph paper notebook today, and I’ve gathered my colored pencils, and now that I’ve done the thinking / deciding stage stage, I’m ready to start the designing stage. This part is a fairly long (but fun) process. I’ll have to also gather fabrics (another fun part), and get all my supplies in order.

I plan to document all the stages here. If you’ve ever done anything like this and have suggestions or thoughts, I’d love to hear them!