Journey To Me

Quilting

I am heading to the cabin for a weekend of rest and rejuvination.  Hopefully, this will occur.  I have decided that because so many family members will be there (due to the Holiday weekend) I am going to create my own entertainment by bringing a couple books and a quilting project with me for those times when all the people are making me wish I was by myself. 

I have been working on a quilt (double irish chain) for about 6 years now.  I am hand quilting it (the reason it is taking so long) and only seem to work on it when I am at the cabin or during the extra cold winters we have in Wisconsin.  It is a beautiful quilt made up mostly of white fabric with a blue and sage green for the "double chain".  I started making it as a wedding gift for some friends of mine, (they have been married now for 6 years and have two children...) but after all this time, I have decided that I must keep it, or give it to my mother.  She is the only other person in the whole world who would appreciate a gift like this.  She "oohs and ahhs" over the quilt everytime she sees it.  She and I recently went to a small theatre and saw a production of a show called "Quilters".  It was about how women in the pioneer days lived and how they used quilting to teach their daughters not only a practical skill, but how they passed down stories from generation to generation. 

I come from a long line of quilters.  I know that my Great-Grandmother quilted (as my mother still uses one of her quilts) my Grandmother still quilts (she has started making baby quilts for her Great Grandchildren, even though she doesn't have any yet.  She says that she would like the future kids to have something from her, even if she doesn't live long enough to meet them.  I cry everytime I think about it!) My Mother makes baby quilts, and I am only on my second full sized quilt.. (I have done 2 baby quilts).  I am sure that the generations before were also very skilled in this, now art, then necessity.

Everything just seems so right when I am quilting.  I cannot tell if it is the peaceful quiet or the feeling that generations of women have been doing what I love and I feel them and their peace channeled in me.  Plus, how can you beat being wrapped up in a large blanket in front of a fire listening to an old time radio station?  I can't think of many ways to beat that.