No Mistakes

Take negativity out of your creative life.

“It’s terrible!” “I don’t like it!” Sound familiar? Grumbling away on a project that’s not working gets you nowhere! You will never see the project’s value if negativity sits in your creative space. It’s like someone pointing a finger at you. What do you do? You stop all communication and get defensive. Listening and seeing stops when you say, “I don’t like it.”

 

IF YOU SAY, I CAN’T. YOU WON’T

IF YOU SAY, I MIGHT, YOU MAY.

IF YOU SAY I CAN, YOU WILL.

Unattained ideas or unfinished projects are not wasted. They are not mistakes. Each one is an experiment where you had the opportunity to learn something. Usually, these projects give your thoughts a pause to sort out why it didn’t work. Was it above your skill level? Were there color balance issues? Was there no emotional connection? Is there just a new “shiny object project” that is now catching your eye? Sometimes, it is not obvious at that moment, but something has happened, and you learned that it just wasn’t coming together. Instead of going down the negativity rabbit hole and throwing that creative tantrum, open yourself up to a small change in the way you think.

You can have a great idea, attempt to build on it, and stall. It certainly doesn’t mean that you just give up! They say the stars have to align, and it’s so true. Your talents, ideas, memories and personal experiences—everything you bring to the creative table—have to mesh. That is what it is to be in the creative flow!

Putting a project aside (a day, a month, or even years!) and not fighting it is the perfect way to move beyond the stalled moment. You can continue to work on other ideas and eventually find that the initial idea has come forward again. Now you have the skills you need to finish the thought. It can be better then you originally dreamed! This is not the only quilt you will ever make!

I have many projects that I have started and not finished. I do not get “worked up” about these projects. They are not a burden to my process. I set them aside and I move on. In fact, I start many projects every single day. When I get an idea, I will make a 15-minute sketch of fabric to capture the energy, that spark of an idea that engaged my conscious. I can come back to it. It could be years before I come back to it, and when I do, I may have a whole new set of ideas I can play up on that original idea.

The realization that I may not have the skills I need to fully bring that thought to fruition is okay, because I am not the same quilt artist that I was ten to twenty years ago. Each day I become a new creative human. I have new experiences, new visions, new conversations, learn new skills, and I morph every idea I have in a different way, depending on what the day before has thrown at me. I can go back and revisit old ideas, old projects started and abandoned, and look at them again with new eyes and say, “Wow, let me use this new idea on this piece and see if I can tell the story I want to tell.”

So go back, bring new eyes to old projects, and see if anything new has transpired since you saw the project last. Some of my very best quilts started this way. Other quilts just never made the cut.… Some took years to find the solution. What’s the rush? Make more quilts, and the rest will fall into place. Stay open to the process.

Detail of I Am Not Perfect and That Is OK

Sometimes, you will see an extended date on my quilts. For instance, I started this quilt in 2008, made the top, started quilting it, and never got around to finishing it. It sat in the back of my brain, saying, “Finish me!” … and finally in 2018, I did. This quilt excites me now as much as it did when I made it, and I closed the full circle of thought. I completed it when I needed to. The time is right. What project can you go back and bring to the finish line?

I Am Not Perfect and That Is OK  /  Victoria Findlay Wolfe, quilted by Victoria Findlay Wolfe and Shelly Pagliai, 2008–2018, 67˝ × 67˝

Fresh off the Farm  /  Victoria Findlay Wolfe, 2013, 79˝ × 82˝, hand and machine quilted

Luminous Views  /  Victoria Findlay Wolfe, quilted by Lisa Sipes, 2014, 67˝ × 67˝

While I was making Luminous Views, I was so taken with the green portions of the quilt that I thought I needed to make this quilt again but floating in a sea of white negative space. I also decided that I needed to decrease the number of seams, so areas of white would be smooth and seam-free. Basically, this means I was piecing full, oddly shaped ovals, which was really difficult. I do love a good challenge, but afterward I thought, Why on earth did I bother? Why? Because it certainly upped my skill set and I’m glad I did it, because it gave me the effect I was looking for.

Green Trees, Clouds & Walt Whitman  /  Victoria Findlay Wolfe, quilted by Karen McTavish, 2014, 82˝ × 82˝

Making Me Crazy  /  Victoria Findlay Wolfe, quilted by Shelly Pagliai, 2011, 59˝ × 82˝

Block instructions can be found in my book 15 Minutes of Play—Improvisational Quilts.

Stellar Fusion  /  Victoria Findlay Wolfe, 2010, 12˝ × 12˝

Inspiration quilt for Tiny Dancer (below)

Tiny Dancer Victoria Findlay Wolfe, 2012, 59˝ × 71˝, from the collection of Susan Wernecke

This quilt was two previous quilt tops! Third time was the charm. Dig out your unfinished tops and bring your freshest “quilty eyes” to the game! You are not the same quilter you were years ago! What new skill, color, and technique can you bring to the quilt-top party? Time to step up and take some risks on those old pieces. What do you have to lose? Your creative challenge awaits!

Romeo’s Stars  /  Victoria Findlay Wolfe, 2013, 67˝ × 67˝

My Good Shirting Stars  /  Victoria Findlay Wolfe, 2011, 72˝ × 74˝

Shine On!  /  Victoria Findlay Wolfe, quilted by Shelly Pagliai, 2014, 67˝ × 67˝

Farm Girl  /  Victoria Findlay Wolfe, quilted by Karen McTavish, 2011–2014, 98˝ × 98˝

My Personal App Quilt, Spotted Joy  /  Victoria Findlay Wolfe, 2014, 36˝ × 36˝, hand quilted

Double-Edged Love  /  Victoria Findlay Wolfe, quilted by Lisa Sipes, 2013, 66˝ × 77˝; from the collection of the International Quilt Study Center & Museum, University of Nebraska–Lincoln, 2016.009.0004

Complete quilt instructions can be found in my book Double Wedding Ring Quilts—Traditions Made Modern.

When I first started quilting feverishly, I tried to do what my grandmother did with her polyester scrap quilts, except use cotton to achieve a similar look. Well, my attention span dwindled and I decided I could get a scrappy overall look faster by mashing all my leftover blocks and unfinished quilt tops (cut up and repurposed) and puzzle it all together, so you could not really see the order in which it was sewn. “That’s one way to master ‘improv and partial seams’!” This quilt was started in April 2000 and finished in 2009. I’ve made many of these scrappy sampler-style quilts. I love the process of figuring out how to get it all to fit together … play!

Everything but the Kitchen Sink  /  Victoria Findlay Wolfe, quilted by Linda Sekerak, 2000–2009, 89˝ × 93˝

Silk Kitchen Sink  /  Victoria Findlay Wolfe, quilted by Laura Clark, 2011–2018, 76˝ × 86˝