It’s been a very long time since I have last posted. To be honest, after that last quilt I posted back in June 2017, I haven’t really worked on any quilting at all. As I went to move to the actual quilting process of those quilts, my heart hurt even more, missing my mom. The quilting part, you see, was her favorite part. She would piece only when she had to, she preferred quilting for other people because she got to do the part she loved and skip the piecing altogether. So when I would even think about sitting at my quilting machine, I would just cry. Sob cries. I was a mess.

The odd thing is, in the weeks after my mom passed, I found myself stockpiling new fabrics. I collected new fabrics from both local stores and from my friend Jessica Darling’s online store Shop Darling Rose. (Jessica, I can’t thank you enough for being there for me in the weeks after my mom died. It’s a shitty club, but I am thankful there are people like you in it to help. Thank you from the bottom of my heart.) I had planned on immersing myself in quilting. It’s close to a year later, and I am just now ironing the fabrics that had been washed, and getting them put onto my comic boards for my fabric wall.

I guess maybe it was one of those instances of foresight, the stockpiling of new fabrics. As I go through them now, during the hardest part of a long winter that is compounded with still dealing with grief, the cheery florals bring me great comfort. My mom would have loved almost all of the fabrics I chose. The above images are a very, VERY small selection of all the fabrics I acquired during that time. Some of them I have no recollection of even buying. I think that’s a pretty good indicator of where I was emotionally then.

The other aspect that is bringing me back to quilting, is just the circle of life. I have a new niece on the way, and she needs a quilt. Her brother and sister each have one from me, and I can’t have her feeling left out or loved less, can I now?

And so, I find myself back in the studio, ironing, folding, cleaning and preparing to piece AND quilt a baby quilt. I’m thankful to have a happy reason to put my hands back to fabrics. I will still feel sad, but I will also feel joy at the fact that I will soon get to meet my new little niece. I am thankful also that her mama is a mom that appreciates the quilts, and also lets me be a part of their lives.

And so, I will begin pulling the fabrics I would like to use, and designing a pattern for the quilt.

I was listening to a 50s music station as I ironed today, because it was some of my mom’s favorite music. She would have laughed to have seen my antics, I could always, always make her laugh. So here you are mama: