A good day is a day spent quilting.

This winter I decided to try something I always wanted to do but never thought I could learn.

I took a local six-week quilting class.

Now I have been sewing since I was 9. I had joined the Busy Beavers 4-H Club in rural South Dakota. I was so excited about being about to choose one of our Holstein calves, teach it to lead by the halter, brush and wash and generally tame her to get it ready to show off at the local Achievement Days that summer.

A few weeks before that time my mom asked what I was planning to do for my 4-H sewing project. Sewing? I didn’t want to sew. I wanted to be outside spending time with my heifer. It was then my mom sat me down and taught me how to sew. She was an excellent seamstress, so I had a lot to learn. I probably grudgingly sewed a potholder or an apron that year to exhibit.

Looking back, I thank my mom for teaching me to sew. I have put my machine or should say machines to work and sewed many, many projects in the past 60 years. Sewing is relaxing and a wonderful way to put my creativeness to work.

But learning how to quilt was a horse of another color for me. Quilting is sewing three or more layers of fabric together. Batting or the like is used in between two layers or more of cotton material. This includes machine sewing and some hand stitching. Projects are as big as king-size bed quilts to small wall hangings.

I was excited to start the weekly classes but secretly hoping the old saying “you can’t teach an old dog new tricks” would not apply to me.

First, we had to pick out the fabric for our project. OK, that sounds easy, right? Wrong. The more colorful bolts of material I saw the more confused I became. Black is my favorite color and because I wear mostly black my daughter always says, “Mom, I think you’re afraid of colors.” Well, I certainly was starting to sweat looking at all the material. Not to worry, my instructor helped pick out all the fabric and made that job easy.

I had to learn how to cut material with a rotary cutter. The blade on one of these is as sharp as a razor. I did slice into a fingernail or two before I got the hang of it.

Cutting needs to be done with accuracy. So, the old saying measure twice and cut once became my motto. I got a big refresher course on how to read a ruler again. Yes, there are little 1/8 measurements on rulers.

Quilters have a whole lingo of their own. Jelly rolls, layer cakes, charms packs, fat eighths, honey buns, HST, RST stitch in the ditch, stash and square up are just a few.

Two other ladies and I made up the class. So, for the next six weeks we met each Tuesday afternoon for two hours and we learned how to sew a quilt. We pressed, we sewed, we ripped, we laughed, we cried, and we laughed some more as our machines buzzed on.

We all ended up with beautiful quilts and the fundamentals of the art of quilting taught by a caring, patient and smart instructor.

I expected to come away from the class with a nice little quilt, but what I didn’t expect was the new friendships I made from this class. The three of us got along so well that we even signed up for the advanced classes so we could have more fun time sewing together. We still keep in touch.

Quilting is fun, it is rewarding, easy to learn and lets you have beautiful items to show for all your hard work. I am especially glad I stepped out of my comfort zone this winter and learned something new.