Category Archives: Family Therapy

A Quilted Memorial for George Ann

Quilt Therapy Posted on by

A very dear friend lost her very short battle with leukemia a couple of nights ago.  She was admitted to the hospital the first week of June and never made it out.  My quilted heart definitely has another seam added to it.

George Ann and I met at our local quilt group meetings.  Her mother had been coming for some time but George Ann didn’t really take to quilting until she retired from her job a few years ago.  Once she was hooked, it was all over but the sewing!

George Ann went with me to spread some quilted cheer to a retreat that Kathryn Rister had near Abilene, Texas last April.  I’m pretty sure we acted like a couple of teenagers, talking the entire way up and back.  We instantly found a friendship and it grew from there.

She saw beauty in nature just as much as she saw beauty in living and in people.  On our way to the retreat, we had to stop by the side of the road to take some photos of a stunning bluebonnet patch of flowers:

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The state flower of Texas, bluebonnets!

George Ann (on left) and Kathryn Rister at a Quilt Retreat.

I am guessing that anyone who came into contact with George Ann found a friend in her.  She was so very likeable and loveable!  And her love of God and all of His creation was so deeply embedded in her heart.  We talked of Bible verses as much as we did about each others’ lives, families and our love of quilting.

On the quilting front, she picked up on it like she’d been doing it her whole life.  She occasionally asked me questions but her momma and at least one of her sisters quilted, too, so I’m sure they helped her way more than I did.  I taught George Ann how to make string quilts and she absolutely LOVED the idea and asked me to start saving my strings for her.  To this day, I still have a “George Ann Strings” bag near my cutting table:

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Saving strings for George Ann.

I took a photo of the quilt I was working on last night, I realized I had just witnessed another God moment – I was making a baby quilt out of Texas A&M fabric and George Ann had (at some point over the last couple of years) told me that they were ‘partial to the Aggies’.

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When I sent out a plea at Christmas to any of my local friends, asking the to help me trim our Christmas tree – George Ann and her momma were at my doorstep (along with a lovely neighbor) within the hour – even though they had more pressing things on their agenda, a friend is a friend and she was all that and a bolt of fabric!

I also uncovered my super-secret angel on Earth.  Ever since my MS diagnosis, I have received an anonymous card with $20 in it, in the mail at the beginning of each month.  Without fail.  And it always came at a time when I needed it most – for gas in the auto, medications, money for the kids, etc.  This month, I did not receive a card…which opened my eyes to the fact that my super-secret angel on Earth is now an Angel in His heavenly Kingdom.

My dear George Ann…I will miss you so very much.  Your zest for life helped she me that my attitude for living with MS could be a positive experience.  Your love of people helped me see how much friends and family are truly the most precious things we have and hold dear, outside our faith and love in our Savior.  Your smile was infectious.  And I will continue to save my strings and selvedges in hopes that I can share a little something with the next quilted heart angel you may send in my direction.

Love without ceasing, pray without ceasing and keep your sewing machine humming in heaven!

Vintage Quilt Love

Quilt Therapy Posted on by

When we travel north and need a place to stay, my cousin always kindly puts us up.  I say kindly because there have been either five or six of us at her house at one time and for someone who is not used to kids around them all the time, it can be a challenge!  When she gave us a place to lay our heads on a pillow in May, she asked me to look at a quilt top she had and tell her how much it would be to finish it.  Since we were there for a funeral, finishing a quilt was the last thing on my list to do so I had my daughter put it in a bag and we brought it home with us.

I either didn’t feel well enough to deal with quilting or didn’t take the time to look at that quilt, but I pulled it out this past weekend and WOW, was I ever in for a treat!  I almost hoped my cousin had found it at a tag sale or flea market so I could buy it from her!  Unfortunately for me, but fortunately for her – she believes it is a quilt that was made by her grandma.

The fabrics are definitely of a 30’s (new fabrics that look like this are called retro) era – and as I looked at the fabrics, all I could think about was that they looked like many of the aprons my own grandmas wore.  Stunning quilt fun for this lover of quilts!

This quilt is machine stitched in a basic log cabin quilt square with about 15″ blocks and the center of the blocks being about 5″ finished and all of the strips around the center are 1/2″ finished.  It is foundation-pieced with unbleached domestic (natural muslin) on the back of the blocks.  All I need to get done is the quilting and the binding and my cousin will have a blessed family heirloom to last for many more years to come.

I felt lucky to have it, hold it and caress it, even if for a very short period of time.  Again, an absolutely beautiful quilt made with a quilter’s heart!

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More photos to come after I get the quilt back from my quilter!

Quilt Therapy?

Quilt Therapy Posted on by

I reserved this domain name a number of years ago – when fabric was about $6/yd.  For those of you who have been quilting and buying quality quilt fabric, you’ll realize this has been my domain name for quite a while.  In that time, I’ve had non-quilters ask me what Quilt Therapy really was…while seasoned quilters smirk and enjoy their own forms of Quilt Therapy.

And back in those earlier days of my quilting, it was said that Quilt Therapy was less expensive than true therapy.  Right now, with the cost of fabrics, quilting, shipping – I would definitely have to say that if you are a proficient quilter, it is NOT cheaper – though, for me, it is way more satisfying!

Let’s see if I can throw out my own definition of Quilt Therapy for you.

A lovely little baby girl was born to a great set of parents, the baby’s mother I personally knew since my youngest daughter was less than one.  This little baby’s mother was my mother’s helper when I had very young children…and as she grew up and got more responsible, she was our go-to babysitter for our kids.  She took the kids to her house in the summer because I worked from home and needed some quiet time to get my work done.  She and her parents took our kids when my husband had to have an emergency appendectomy…and they took our kids in when a precious life ended far too soon and we had to fly from Utah to Texas to attend her services.  If we were going somewhere and needed an extra set of hands (like to the public swimming pool), she went with us.  She was and still is an awesome person – and we could not have been more pleased when she finally had a baby of her own.  She spent a few years of her marriage with just her husband, because her mom told me that her babysitting my four kids was the best birth control there ever was!  I think they’d been married for about five (or more) years before they had this precious new life in their hearts and in their home.

This new baby calls to me and I begin MY Quilt Therapy.  It can be a long and winding road, especially if I have to rip out a seam or two (or six), but the Quilt Therapy gives me such a blast of fresh quilted air that I enjoy every single process of making a quilt.

I am not as expedient nor able to quilt quite as much as I used to – with this multiple sclerosis, I can usually get in 15 – 30 minutes, on my feet (choosing or buying fabric, cutting, ironing, etc.) most days before my body parts start screaming for relief.  So now, when I make a quilt, I spend however many hours or days it takes to cut out the quilt pieces.  Then I rest.  Another few days and I will press all of the cut out pieces.  Then I rest.  Sitting down to piece a quilt top is pretty simple, and even more simple when it’s a baby quilt because it’s smaller than larger bed quilts.  But, there is ironing involved in that piecing process and once again, I do my piecing in daily/weekly increments so as not to be in too much pain.

So, now I have the quilt top done…however my Quilt Therapy isn’t finished yet!

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This is a photograph of the completed baby quilt top.

Once the top is done, I have to decide if I can quilt it on my domestic machine or if I want a professional quilter to use her long-arm and quilt it for me.  In this case, I decided to go with a pro (Kathryn Rister) – mostly because a baby quilt is usually used a lot and washed a lot and it needs to stand up to the test of time.

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This is a close-up of part of the quilt top quilted.

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Although it’s not easy to see, this is the professionally quilted quilt top.

Next in the Quilt Therapy process is the binding.  Then the label on the back…and sending the completed quilt to the little baby it was intended for.  Not yet!  I’m not quite done with my Quilt Therapy for this quilt.

THIS is the closure I get when I enjoy my Quilt Therapy:

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Dear Mike

Quilt Therapy Posted on by

As I sit here this day, I wonder what heaven is like.  I wonder what death is like.  I wonder how many others are using you as a guardian angel.  I even wonder how many others remember this anniversary from 1997.  And, I wonder if I’ll ever stop missing you.

On the anniversary of your death, I clearly remember what we were doing the day before you passed through to your heavenly home.  My husband and I had gone to San Marcos so he could work and so I could have my first visit with my OB/GYN as I was pregnant with child #2.  You had been in the waiting room when we had DD#1 and I wouldn’t have had it any other way – I always felt like we shared our first baby with you, especially since we talked on the phone weekly (sometimes more than once a week).  I wanted to share as much of this new pregnancy as I could with you as I knew you were not going to have kids…and just the little things regarding our first daughter brought you some of the best joy.

I called you from the campground where we were staying for the night and let you listen to the heartbeat of baby #2 – I had recorded it just for you, so you could be with us in the same way you were involved with our first child.  You laughed and said that heartbeat “sounded like a freight train”.

Little did I know that it would be the last conversation I would have with you – at least while we were both alive.

The next day was Father’s Day.  In 1976, our dad died before we could have another Father’s Day with him.  We made it back to our home in Corpus Christi and I got a frantic phone call from Trickie.  She said something had happened and your eyes rolled up in the back of your head and you were unresponsive.  She had called her mom, a nurse, before she had called me as well as 911 – but, I was the first one she called, in our family, because she knew how hurt I’d be if I didn’t hear something so awful from someone else.  A few hours later, I received a call from an aunt who had a police scanner and said she was so very sorry but you had never regained consciousness and were DOA.  I was crying and screaming and so very upset.  You were the best friend I ever had, outside of my husband.  To this day, I still don’t have a best friend that cared about me as much as you did.  Or that cared about having a sibling relationship in the manner with which you and I had.

I talk to you often, even if it’s just in prayer.  I make sure to visit with you when I have a question about our family and pray for your wisdom to help me see through the quagmire of life to find an answer to my dilemma.

I cannot say I wish we had never gotten so close because without your love and showing me how to love, I was able to find and fall in love with my husband.  We have four wonderful (most of the time, which you would definitely laugh at) kids and none of them know their Uncle Mike except through some old family photos and my stories to them.  But, those stories do not take the place of having you here.

I miss having you here.

I miss you.

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Forever your Sister, Tammy

This Little Heart of Mine!

Quilt Therapy Posted on by

My sista/cuz (her folks, my aunt and uncle, finished raising me) had three children…and then there was a sweet little girl who needed a whole lot of love, related to my sista/cuz on the other side of her family.  And my sista/cuz and her husband decided they could handle one more little girl in need, so they adopted her!  Things aren’t always easy when trying to raise a younger-than-five-years-old little girl, especially since she previously lived her life as the only child with her other grandparents.  They are still going through some therapy but I think things are getting better.  Now my sista/cuz has the exact number of children and even the exact placement of kids as we have – two girls, then a boy, then another girl!

With that extra child, I haven’t done very well at keeping her wrapped in quilted love.  Mainly because of the unknown with my MS – unknown as to whether I would wake up each day, unknown as to how I would feel each day, unknown how I would feel each evening when I normally quilt, etc. etc.

I made “heart” quilts for each of my sista/cuz’s first three children.  I don’t think any three are the same, but I could be wrong.  I do know that every quilt had a heart as the focus of the quilt.  For my newest niece, I made a very simple, very clear (to a little girl) heart design, then added a few more borders to make the quilt big enough to cover her in quilted love.

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My aunt and uncle should have delivered my newest niece with the quilt above, and I can’t wait to hear how she likes it!

Do you have a theme for quilts that you make, especially for kids in the same family?  If so, what themes have you used?