Sharyn Resvick 1. What attracted you to quilting? I love fabrics. I love the mathematics of cutting fabrics. I love using my machine to sew them together. I love seeing the myriad colors and shapes together on my design wall. I love spending time in my sewing studio. I had sewn my own clothing for years from middle school into my 20s and then took a decade break from sewing when the blue jean era came in. When I was introduced to quilting in my mid-30s, I knew I had found a venue that would allow me to return to my love of textiles and sewing and my creations no longer had to fit my body. 2. Did you have ancestors who quilted? When did you begin? My maternal grandmother did a bit of quilting and had made a quilt for each of her eight children when they married. My mother was the recipient of a Sunflower Quilt from a Mountain Mist pattern and I remember the quilt on the guest room bed for years as I was growing up. I am now the lucky recipient of that quilt. I was 35 and living in Aurora, Illinois, when a neighbor invited another neighbor and me to make a little fabric Easter wall hanging. It needed nine different fabrics so we headed off to a quilt shop to buy three fabrics each as none of us had a stash. I had never been to an official quilt shop and was absolutely fascinated with all the fabrics lined up in color families. I think I was instantly hooked, signed up for my first quilt class and left with a bag full of fabric. I had become a quilter and the rest is history. 3. Did a certain style of quilting appeal to you? I like what I call “controlled scrap quilts.” I love putting many fabrics together, but I like the color scheme to somewhat match in value and scale. I had a teacher in Dallas once tell me, “Why would you stop at four fabrics if you could use 40? And why stop at 40 if you could use 400?” 4. What do you like most about making a quilt? My favorite steps in the quiltmaking process are the purchasing of the fabric and the cutting process. I love combining different fabrics, textures, and designs to come up with an aesthetically pleasing color palette. I also love to cut out the project. I love the precision and control of using the ruler and rotary cutter and having all my pieces neatly lined up in my project bag ready for sewing. I feel like I am in control of my world when cutting out a new project. 5. Have you developed a preferred technique? A preferred style? I love very detailed pieced quilts best. I like all styles of quilts but am always drawn back to quilts that resemble the old quilts from the 1800s era. I love the history they invoke, and I like to imagine the women’s lives that made the quilts. I also like touches of appliqué in quilts but never seem to have the time to do the time-consuming hand-stitching required so l have become somewhat of an expert with Invisible machine appliqué for its speed in applying the prepped pieces to the background. I have taught the technique numerous times in quilt shops and guilds. 6. What would you say about quilting’s impact on your life? Quilting has evolved into a passion that runs deep in my life and defines who I am. It has become my social life and has given me many wonderful friendships and experiences. It is my creative outlet in life. The pinnacle of my quilting career was being asked to exhibit my Threads of Time quilt collection (a collection of small quilts I have made depicting the history of quilting from the 1800s quilt styles to the modern quilt styles of today) at the Minnesota State Quilt Show in 2018 and then again at the Red River Quilt Show in Grand Forks, North Dakota in 2019. As a result of these exhibits, I have been asked to present my lecture and trunk show to many quilt guilds, libraries, women’s groups, and senior centers in a four-state area in the last two years. I love sharing my quilts with others. 7. Select a quilt that you have made and talk specifically about it? “At Piece with Time – A Woman’s Journey Stitched in Cloth” *Why did you make it? I made this quilt as a block-of-the-month project for the Chaska Area Quilt Club. I was the coordinator and based my project on the book of the same name by Kristin Steiner and Diane Frankenberger. Each block was to represent an aspect of our life such as our childhood, our hopes and dreams, our family, etc., and we were to journal each month with writings corresponding to the specific block name. This gave me an opportunity to combine my love of quilting and scrapbooking. I had such fun selecting blocks that represented the 12 areas I wanted to include. (Memory Block to represent childhood, Home Treasures to represent hopes and dreams, Sister’s Choice to represent family, etc.) *What does it mean to you? I think of this quilt as a kind of personal life journal made in fabric, a story quilt. I chose a medallion setting as I wanted to include an appliqué block in the center to represent my favorite quilt block – Rose of Sharon. A must with my namesake, Sharyn. This is an example of my signature Invisible Machine Appliqué that I’m known for in my circle. *Does it fit into your overall quilting history? This quilt is not in my typical, beloved scrap quilt style but is made in my favorite color palette of rich, warm reds, greens, and golds with accents of red- violet. It does include many different fabrics in each color family to satisfy my love of scrap quilts, and it includes a center of appliqué. “Friendship Stars” *What does this quilt mean to you? This quilt has many memories of my start in the quilting world. I had been introduced to quilting in the 1980s while living in Chicago and then, shortly after, I moved to the Dallas area where I became totally immersed in the quilting world. I joined my first quilt guild there, attended my first quilt re- treat, attended my first national quilt show, took a multitude of classes and started accumulating my wonderful stash of fabrics. I chose this star pat- tern a couple years into my quilting journey as I had been collecting and saving fabric scraps from my many projects and also collecting and trading fabrics with my quilting friends in classes and at retreats and wanted to put them all together in a quilt as a reminder of these friends and projects. When I look at this quilt, I can actually remember specifics such as a quilted jacket my friend made, the jewel-toned fabrics another friend loved, the little girl dresses another friend made for a home sewing business, various classes I took, etc. I think it is reminiscent of quilts of old that were made from family clothing and is a perfect example of the saying, “Every quilt tells a story.”