Making things, even when we don't need to make them, is important.

Cloth is a deceptively humble material to work with, it lacks the status of paint or marble or metal. Yet, it is cloth that receives us at birth and covers us at death. It is hard to find a moment in a day when we are not using cloth in some form.

I believe that it is important to have around us things which are made by ourselves or by people we know. 

Made by hand matters.

There is an intangible but important quality contained in an object made by hands we know, or in an object with a story we know. We feel more comforted, more grounded, under a quilt made by family or friend. Our mood is warmed by the sight of handworked cushions, placemats, hangings and rugs in the rooms of our homes.

We feel continuity and membership when we are making make things we remember our mothers or grandmothers making. Every spring I feel my grandmother strongly when I plant seeds. The sight of someone knitting brings my mother back to me.

Oddly, or not oddly, this same sense of connection and membership also happens when we engage in hand making things that our own families didn't make also. The first time I sat at a spinning wheel I felt linked to all the generations of women who sat to spin the wool that would clothe their families.

Making things, even when we don't need to make them, is important, for ourselves but also for others. 

It's also simply fun.

Enjoy your projects, 

Susan