Learning by Mistakes

I am not sure any choice we make is really a mistake. Oh sure, our choices will cost us, and sometimes in quilting, just as in life, an ill-made choice doesn't produce the results we want and costs us in resources, time or relationships. Bottom line, is that it must become a lesson learned or we are going to make it again and again until we do get it right.

I made eight mug rugs using the batik squares my friend Virginia sent me. I loved how seven of them turned out. The squares are quite unique & came from her Mother's estate, so may have been purchased many years ago.

One didn't quite do it for me. I tried something different on it because I ran out of the batik strips I had in my stash, and used a larger piece of batik that seemed to coordinate with its colors. The batik fabric, for all its beauty, overpowered the square. It was too much and focus on the square was lost. Perhaps I should have cut it into strips and centered the square rather than put it in the corner. With so small a piece, having only one focus might have made it work better. 

However, it gave me an opportunity to practice some free motion quilting. I am donating it to the give-away table at the clubhouse where I baste. Someone will like it or have a use for it, even if they give it to a cat as a cozy landing place. The backside is one fabric that is ok too.

My projects wizz by quickly and other than this blog, I haven't taken notes to say what works and what doesn't. Like most people, when I choose unwisely, I just brush it aside and keep going. Hopefully, somewhere, in the recesses of my mind, there is a memory stored that can serve as an inner voice telling me to chose differently and better. Most of the time, we don't share our own mistakes as much as we share our successes. Yet, perhaps we should so that others can benefit in their lives and with their choices. 

But then, would they? Or does a person have to walk their own path to find their own values and meaning?

I have had other 'failures' with some mug rugs I've made and called them practice pieces. Some quilts are like that too. And when I think of it, some relationships I've had that didn't work out were practice pieces. I learned first of all, what I didn't want in my life, learned to self-identify so that I discovered my values, my behavior & how I fit in the various circles. Its not a failure to evolve. Its not a mistake to step away from dysfunction. Sometimes it takes a lifetime to get the process of living down & right, honorable & authentic.