From 1970’s Skirt to Potholders

The Patchwork Skirt, after I got to it.
The Patchwork Skirt, after I got to it.

Sometimes making potholders is just what I feel like doing.  After expending a certain kind of creative energy on my last wallhanging,  dealing with the simplicity of shapes and colors in my potholders is a welcome change.

What I’ve learned about making potholders is to create a limit or a challenge.  Otherwise, there are too many options, and I get stuck in endless possibility.  So yesterday, I took the very long, homemade,  patchwork skirt (probably from the 70’s) that someone sent me and decided to make a batch of potholders using just the patches from it.  Then I immediately broke my own rule and pulled out two pairs of  cotton shorts that someone else gave me, one teal the other purple and added them to the mix.  Because the colors were just right.

I like the idea that I was reusing already reused fabric. But some of it I couldn’t use.  I looked at one of the black patches, which would have been perfect for a potholder I was designing, and said to it, Sorry, you’re just not potholder material.   It was a thin polyester.  Whoever made the skirt used the back of the fabric.  There were white stripes on the front.  I saved it and some of the other patches for a quilt.

I might make a few more potholders today.  The last one I did gave me an idea of a new design.   Here’s what the skirt  became at the end of yesterday….

 Nine Potholders Made from the patchwork Skirt
Nine Potholders I designed from the patchwork skirt.

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Full Moon Fiber Art