Playing By the Rules

This post in no way is intended to point fingers or say something is right or wrong. Not in the least. It's just a reflection back in time - my time - to when I first started quilting. If you follow with any regularity, you'll already know much has changed for me along the way. And depending on how long you've been quilting, I bet much has changed for you as well. But in sharing recently about one of my first quilts Back in the Day, it made me recall many of 'the rules' I lived by. Basically, the techniques and guidelines I learned in my beginning quilting class in 1987 remained exactly what I did for many years following:

• Choose a large floral, then pick fabrics with those colors, but varying values, to round out the fabric pull. Include large, medium, and small scale prints to provide balance to the quilt.
• Hand-piecing, which lasted for just two quilts, a 9-patch sampler, and the quilt you'll see below. But by then it was second nature.
• Press seams to the side and to the dark side. Always.
• Quilt blocks were separated by sashing, and every quilt top was finished off with a border.
• A solid backing was the name of the game, and for some reason, I always chose muslin - maybe so that the quilting showed up well?
• Basting was done by hand with a long needle and a long running stitch.
• I only hand-quilted for a very long time.... over 20 years. I finally sent a quilt to be long-armed in 2003 and did that occasionally until I eventually started machine quilting most of my own quilts in 2010.
• Bias binding, cut at 2" wide, finished by hand. 
• A hand-written label. Of course.

Case in point is the quilt below - my second quilt, finished in 1990. My long-time friend Sharon/@redapplestitches went along to our local quilt shop and helped me choose the fabrics. The rust-colored focal isn't that large of a print, but otherwise, this quilt fits all the 'rules' listed above. "Shirley's Sampler" measures 74" x 88" and is completely hand-pieced and hand-quilted. It took me a year to piece, a year to quilt, and the finished quilt hung beneath the vaulted ceiling in our living room for ages.

Things have really changed, haven't they?! {grin} And those rules? Eventually I felt confident enough to break each one. Oh good, right? I remember them with fondness, while thankful that in my quilting endeavors today,  the rules are few and far between.

So what rules do you create by? Any you have given up on? How about ones you are itching to break? Do tell.