audition for sewvivor round 3 - emily carroll

hey howdy hey.
my name is emily, and i'm auditioning for the part of super awesome sew-vivor 3's top 16.  super exciting, that's for sure!  my cousin lisa auditioned for sew-vivor's round 2 last year, and made sure i knew about this uber cool quilting round this year.  she's all about kids clothes & that fun stuff, but i'm all about quilts.  so what the heck.  why not audition.  so here's a smidge about me before i get to sharing my entry piece :)
as you learned, my name is emily.
i am a 25 year old with a bachelors degree in photography & soon to be an associates degree in early childhood education.  i've been a dance teacher for nearly 10 years, and adore working with kids.  i love disneyland, mexican food, and late night oreo sundaes.  i have a grumpy black & white cat named elroy who lurks in the shadows, plus a desire to always pick up pennies off the sidewalk.
i'm well versed on television shows with top 16s, but modeling & singing just aren't my style.
i took my first sewing class many moons ago, and somewhere in my hodge podge of a room, still have the first quilt i ever made.  someday i'll have to locate that little bugger and blog it.
i come from a family of crafters, and have always been doing something in one way or another.
both my parents sew in one way or another, as do various grandmas & a few of my aunts are crafty in their own rights.
my mom has headed up the costumes for our dance studio for what feels like forever, and my dad makes soft puppets that he uses for ventriloquism.  i mentioned my cousin lisa, who is also an avid sewer, and both of her parents are crafty in their own rights.  p.s. our dads are twins... which makes our cousinly-ness even that more awesome.  we always planned to open a mall kiosk to sell our crafted goodies... but will have to settle on using our etsy site for now.
i'm sure you're thinking "but emily... why quilts?  you're 25..."
just kidding.  you the judges are above the average person.  when people ask what i do in my spare time, and i answer that i make quilts, i usually get the response "oh my mom/grandma does that..." with the undertone of "you have the hobby of an old woman with a house full of cats"  well...  yeah.  but i'm awesome.
i'm not really a fan of yarn crafts.  i can crochet a smidge, but never really picked up on knitting... perhaps that could be because i have a "teach yourself how to knit" book that has never been opened.  i bought that in 2010 i think.  oops.  i cross stitch a little bit here and there, and since my mom generally made all our christmas & easter dresses, i never really desired to take up clothing construction.
i made that first quilt when i took a "kids can sew" class probably around age 7 or 8, but then never again until my senior year of high school.  i had to do a senior project that benefited the community in one way or another.  i swore up and down that i would NOT just make quilts.  well, after two other failed project attempts, what did i do?
i made quilts.
27 very basic, but very quilty quilts, that were donated to shriner's children's hospital in the end.
this was in 2006, and after a lot of ins and outs of being crafty and such, i feel that now is better than ever to really continue to push my quilt creating skills even further above and beyond where i was 8 years ago.  i've gone from these basic 9 blocks & t-shirt quilts, to log house cabins, railfence quilts and much, much, more.  things progressed from simple yarn knots to keep the layers together, to having my grandma quilt things for me.  this past august my grandma broke her hip, and at the time she was going to quilt some projects for me.  whelp, that wasn't exactly doable, so she talked me through the process and i started to quilt things myself.  so far, basic stitch in the ditch or straight line designs, but i have already made plans to take things on my own to the next level in the coming months and take a free motion quilting class at a local store.  i've harnessed a real enjoyment for the craft, and finally feel like i truly found my niche in with my crafty family.  without further adieu, i introduce to you judges my 2014 sew-vivor entry:
this past december i participated in the catvent quilt along put on by elizabeth hartman of oh, fransson!
we are very much cat people in this house, and this was a fun project that gave me something to keep doing while i was enduring finals at that point of time as well.  i feel like this help showcase what i am capable of, as well as hints towards the potential i could have in this competition.  this quilt was entirely done by me: fabric selection from a box of inherited batiks, piecing each cat, completing the top, ALL the 1" quilting, and blind stitching the binding to finish things off.
i cannot imagine another quilt at this moment that better showcases everything rolled in to one.  this quilt to me helps show how far things have come, and my determination to the craft.  i love trying new things, and having a challenge/competition aspect to it all would just make things extra exciting!
i would absolutely love to be a part of this competition and to meet some new individuals out there in the crafty quilting community.  cannot wait to embark on this journey :)
i'll try not to cry too hard if i get voted off the island.
but hopefully, it won't come to that ;)  even making top 16 would be a dream.
thanks for stopping by, and happy crafting!

if you want to cruise some of my other quilts, click here!