Today we are excited to introduce Aurifil Artisan Kim Lapacek of Persimon Dreams! She is going to tell us all about Project QUILTING, an annual quilting and sewing challenge that she started 9 years ago. Take it away Kim!
True confession time: I have a degree in engineering and worked in the field about 6 years.
I was not like normal teenagers. I loved school and was always the first in line to try new thing, join groups and/or lead the groups. When I was a sophomore I attended a “Women in Engineering” seminar. My favorite thing was when we were given a limited amount of items and asked to find the solution (such as, plug the circular hole with only square supplies). That was the moment I decided to be an engineer. I love math and art and thought it would be a great way to utilize both of my talents.
It didn’t take me long to realize that jobs in the real world aren’t usually taking random things and creating solution. It’s a lot more, “Let’s make the client happy by spending as little of their money as possible.” I had a great job and enjoyed what I did but didn’t love it enough to miss my girls’ growing up.
A few days (literally) after I had my second daughter I decided it was time to open an etsy site. I would sew quilts and make jewelry. As you can imagine it wasn’t as easy as you think – it takes a lot of hustle. Plus, constantly justifying fair pricing. That kind of work will suck the fun from any endeavor, and I wasn’t happy.
About that time I discovered Project Runway and fell in love. It wasn’t the fashion that got to me (just look at me on any given day … definitely not about the fashion), but what those folks could do when given such a short amount of time to make an outfit! It was an amazing lesson — that you just have to go for it, trust yourself, and start sewing.
So I decided to start “Project QUILTING” with the challenge of sewing a quilt in just one week. It’s allowed me to locate my inner artist and rekindle my passion for quilting. I’ve trusted my gut, just started to sew, and in some cases, “made it work.” Project QUILTING has opened so many doors for me: an appearance on Sewing with Nancy, speaking to quilt guilds throughout the US, and building a supportive challenge-loving community on Facebook.
We are currently in Season 9 and the first challenge was posted on Sunday – Hometown Proud. You can find out all the details on my blog:
www.PersimonDreams.blogspot.com
New challenges will be posted every other Sunday through March 18th, 2018
Who knows? Maybe Project QUILTING will be your new favorite thing.
Some examples of quilts made for past challenges:
One participant, Kimberly Rolzhausen made a mini quilt that fit the “Carolina Lily” Project QUILTING challenge and her own personal challenge to make all her quilts for season 8 be related to Star Wars!
Project Quilting is a great opportunity to try something new! Laura Piland of Slice of Pi Quilts made her first whole cloth quilt for a project quilting challenge.
There are no size requirements for Project QUILTING! You can make a quilt as small as (or smaller than) 2” x 3” like Paula Fleischer of Political Thread did for the “texture” challenge.
About Kim
Facebook – Twitter – Instagram – Blog – Pinterest
Kim Lapacek is a mother, wife, artist, dreamer, apple orchardist, retired civil engineer, and entrepreneur. She works best under pressure and rarely backs down from a challenge.
Cool projects! Have a fun day!!
Love your quilts enlightening!!
I just completed making quilts for my two grandnephews and one grandniece for Christmas this year. They are 17, 15 and 13. Started working on them on Halloween. I’ve never made a quilt before but thought this can’t be that complicated. Boy was I in for some big surprises. But despite the hundreds of hours it took, I’ve been bitten by the quilt bee. Yours look abstract with a lot of different things going on. Would love to know how you piece it all together.. your quilts are exquisite.
Can’t wait to see the next challenge! Got in too late for this weeks. I need to put these on the calendar.