Monday, August 16, 2010

as she sleeps...

...i can see the baby she was 17 years ago.

...i can imagine her future as she steps to the edge of adulthood.

...i can pray she will never change and allow the world to make her hard.

...i can hope the hopes that all mothers hope for.

...i can wish she still listened to veggie tales and not hard core christian metal.

...i can dream for her.

Sunday, August 1, 2010

my labor of love

i have recently taken up quilting. about a year ago i decided i needed a new hobby. i have always sewn but nothing was really getting me stirred up. when i really searched my heart i realized i wanted to do something that would have a legacy. i wanted to make something that my children and someday wayyyyy in the future my grandchildren would use.


i still have several quilts that my grandmother and 1st mother-in-law made me and they get more and more special everytime i use them. or when i see one of my kids wrapped up in them. at my granny's house she didn't own any blankets that i remember all she had was quilts and we used them for everything.


so about a year ago i decided to start making quilts....it couldn't be that hard right? right! i quickly learned there was so much more to quilting that just sewing a top together. the piecing is just the start then you have to be concerned about battings and needles and thread and backings and sashings and borders and marking pens or pencils and on and on and on and on. so in my quest i found and have joined a quilters guild. i am the youngest member at 42 the next youngest lady is 66 and the oldest lady is 91. we get together every wednesday and have an old fashioned quilting bee.


right after joining the group i was asked by a lovely young woman if i could make her a quilt. i of course said yes. she had just lost her 5 month old baby girl and couldn't part with any of her clothes but knew she couldn't hang on to all these clothes. her first thought was could a quilt be made out of them. after looking at what she had i decided we could make a heirloom quilt from the baby's cotton dresses but she still had a whole lot of onesies and such and she really wanted something she could hang on to and cry on and sleep with and just have with her at all times. My quilting friend Linda made the heirloom quilt and i made the other two.



this is mom's rag quilt. i took 5" by 5" squares from the baby's onesies and you turn the seams outward to create a rag effect.

this is the heirloom quilt from all the cotton clothes


and then for the dad i made a t-shirt quilt from all the little onesies he had bought.