Friday, January 06, 2006

Stitching It Up


This is the quilt I made for my mother for Christmas. I designed it (it's a bird - I was told you can't tell.) I cut out all of the squares and triangles then sewed them together by hand. There are 357 two and a half inch squares (17 columns and 21 rows.) I would say there are about 80 hours into the quilt.

I love sewing by hand. I find it very relaxing.

I made this for my mother because I had sewn a quilt for my daughter made from my maternity clothes. We lived at my parents house at the time and my mother would cover herself up with the quilt at night when she was relaxing in her recliner. When we moved out, I took the blanket and my mother said she missed it.

So, I made the blanket. I sewed prayers into each stitch that her pain would ease everytime she put it on her lap. Each stitch was a wish that we could get along better, have more in common, be closer. When she opened her gift, she said, "Oh, you made me a quilt." They next day, she said, "There are a lot of tiny stitches." I was a bit underwhelmed.

My one and only, dear brother commented, "You must have a lot of time on your hands." (Which is also what he said when he looked at my website and when I told him I was taking a novel writing class at our county college.

My father and my sister-in-law said absolutely nothing.

It's a good thing I have loving and supportive family members.

2 comments:

  1. l love the quilt and the white angel. but more than anything else i love the thought!
    and somewhere my intution (which i am quite proud of) tells me that your mom would have loved it too. she just may not be as expressive with her emotions. some people are like that.

    please cheer up.

    and you must make yourself a white angel.

    and dont wait for next year. make it now.

    merry christmas.

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  2. Hey! I absolutely love the quilt. I wanted to handstitch one (bought hundreds of dollars worth worth of fat quarters and quilting equipment) and got stuck, forget halfway, not even one tenth of the way through. It was supposed to be a tree of life quilt and I was supposed to give it to one of my friends for her wedding. Well, she got married, and divorced and there it lies, diassembled in a green plastic bag, likely to remain so, for some time.

    On the other hand, I love making stuff for Christmas presents. They are usually pretty treasured.

    Good on you, anyway. Am sure the prayers you stitched into this work of art will be realised. There's too much love for it not to be.

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