Y-kun's quilt

On my sewing room floor are 10 blocks... a start at a Heartstrings quilt.  But I'm not making it!  Actually I am making half of it.

Y-kun comes weekly for English (and cooking and juicing).  I've given him permission to go upstairs to my sewing room and he finds "treasures" in my bead drawer, in my leaders/enders box and in my scrap bin.  He is constantly asking me if he can take home some scraps though they seem to just live in his English bag but he enjoys finding pretty colors and patterns.

"Y-kun, why don't you make a quilt?  I'll help you."

"A quilt will take years.  I can never make a quilt."

"You come early every week, you like to play with my fabrics.  You can make one block at a time and we'll see how many you can get made."

I cut up some sheeting fabric and made some center strips and since then have let Y-kun have the run of my strings bin.  I have taught him how to sew a straight seam (we still need to work on that a bit) and he has mastered using the pedal and the thread cutter.  Last night Y-kun got a lesson on winding a bobbin and rethreading the sewing machine. 

I don't know why Y-kun has trouble sewing that 1/4 inch seam allowance.  I think he is pulling the fabric as he sews... I have explained and explained that he needs to watch the sewing foot edge but by the end of the strip he has got only threads holding the fabric together.

"Do it again.  It is just taking you longer having to redo things you know."

A Heartstrings quilt is very forgiving.  Y-kun can go over and over the same two strips of fabric until he's got something close to a 1/4 inch seam allowance.

Ironing has been a lesson for Y-kun too!

"Don't push so hard that you get the whole block out of shape.  Just make sure the fabric lies flat and press on top."

Y-kun is an aggressive ironer.

Last night the other boy in our class watched Y-kun put in the last few stitches on the block he was working on.

"This is so easy.  You ought to try it.  We will have to know how to sew when we get to jr. high school you know."

A little boasting there...  The other boy wasn't the least interested in playing with fabric...
I have promised Y-kun that for each block he makes, I will make him one during the week.  That way he only has half the work to do and his quilt grows magically.  He loves laying out the blocks to see how many we have made...  12 more to go?  Hmmm... Maybe more... but we are sewing in baby steps  No hurry.

Last night Y-kun started eyeing my fabric stash, not my left over fabric.

"Sensei, I want to use some of THAT!"

Nothing may be safe in my sewing room while Y-kun is up there!