Thanksgiving and Memories

Oops! I must have gotten busy over the last few weeks because I just discovered this Thanksgiving weekend post. Here it is, hopefully better late than never.


It's not unusual for people to become nostalgic at holiday time; cementing tradition is part of the  plan.

So is reviving memories, and quilting certainly lends itself to that, what with making quilts for special occasions, using certain patterns to invoke feelings and messages, giving quilts as gifts to commemorate milestones...

And here on this Thanksgiving weekend I've come across just such a heart string. I found the  "label" I wrote for the third quilt I ever made. I didn't know back then (1991) that sewing an annotated history of the quilt onto the quilt was good to do. I merely wrote a note and handed it and the wall hanging off to my mom, who had the foresight to encase my bad handwriting in plastic. Thanks, Mom.

"Unlimited Mileage

This piece, my third, was done for my mother's 60th birthday -- 8/15/91. It commemorates our April '91 trip to Paducah, KY, for the American Quilter's Society annual conference.

The Mariner's Compass block is for all the "unlimited mileage" we put on the car. The deep turquoise is for the bridges over the Ohio and Mississippi rivers. The gold fabric is for the ceiling of the lobby bar at the Peabody Hotel in Memphis. The red fabric is for the Catherine the Great exhibit. The long row border is for the long, flat Missouri roads."

Well, now.

No one told me back then that making a Mariner's Compass (in the era before paper piecing) wasn't something a novice should do. I'm happy it doesn't bow that much in the center (grin). But more than any other quilt I've made, that one is special.

I'm sure every quilter has a super special quilt, even when it's impossible to choose among the "children." Feel free to share your favorites with us on Facebook or here on the Publishing blog.