The map has a meaning?

Maybe I’m feeling a bit philosophical right now, but I think the map quilt that I just finished has some deeper significance than using up extra fabric. I had 3 pieces of fabric with maps on them and originally they were all going to go into a quilt together just because they were maps. I rejected one of them. The colors weren’t really compatible with the others and it just looked a bit too cartoonish. I used a large variety of other fabrics and assembled my quilt with a definite north-south orientation.

There were a few edits after this pic and then I started quilting it. I couldn’t bring myself to do the whole thing in a straight line grid, as this fabric suggested.

But maps are marked off and measured that way, as if you could get from one location to another by following that grid. The other map fabric showed some latitude and longitude lines, but it wanted a swirly design–like the winds that blew the early sailors and explorers from place to place.

The rows of up and down strips are surely meant to be jungles and trees and grasses found in all those new lands.

I don’t usually give this kind of thought to ‘quilt’ quilts that I make. They are only covers, meant to keep you warm. Art quilts most often have some deeper thoughts behind them. I have no idea why this one made me so fanciful but I guess maps can open your thoughts up to all the possibilities of the wide world.

In the real world, though, I’m happy knowing that I can make something to keep my loved ones warm and snuggly. Most days that’s as wide as my world needs to be.