Julie's Genealogy & More

 Quilting

 

 

 

...we come to quilt making looking for a respite
from one set of challenges by embracing a very different set
-- involving color, pattern, sensuality, skill, and order, in
an ever-changing mixture....

The act of making patchwork quilts provided an oasis of grace
in my life. I pitched my pieced tent in that oasis,

finding shelter and warmth for my psyche...

from Quilting to Save My Life by Janet Catherine Berlo

Author of Quilting Lessons: Notes from the Scrap Bag of a Writer and Quilter

 

View My Quilts

 

Our Heavenly Father uses our scraps
Of talents and abilities
By piecing them together
To serve a purpose.
We are tied together
By faith in God
Who is our comforter

I SUPPORT:

 

Ami Simms'

Forgetting Piece by Piece

&

Priority Quilt

projects to benefit

the

Alzheimer's Association

 

 

Quilt to Remember

by the

American Alzheimer's Foundation

 

 

 

from an unidentified source:

Quilting satisfies me. Old quilts speak to me of what "women's' work" has ever been--providing warmth and comfort, while expressing sometimes otherwise unnoticed depths of creativity and love of beauty in everyday things. Like architecture, quilts are art that surrounds us and enriches our families lives and our culture as a whole. I love the feel and smell of fabric. I love the vast choices of color and design. I love the feeling of a sharp blade slicing cleanly through cloth and the soothing rhythm of hand sewing. I love the company of women sewing and visiting and the solitude of listening to music while I quilt alone.

 

 

AUNT JANE OF KENTUCKY by Eliza Calvert Hall:


"I've been a hard worker all my life, but 'most all my work has been the kind that 'perishes with the usin',' as the Bible says. That's the discouragin' thing about a woman's work. If a woman was to see all the dishes that she had to wash before she died piled up before her in one pile, she'd lie down and die right then and there. I've always had the name o' bein' a good housekeeper, but when I'm dead and gone there ain't anybody goin' to think o' the floors I've swept, and the tables I've scrubbed, and the old clothes I've patched, and the stockin's I've darned, but when one of my grandchildren or great-grandchildren sees one o' these quilts, they'll think about Aunt Jane, and, wherever I am then, I'll know I ain't forgotten."

 

"Patchwork?  An, no!  It was memory, imagination, history, biography, joy, sorrow, philosophy, religion, romance, realism, life, love & death, and overall, like a halo, the love of the artist for his work and the souls longing for earthly mortality."

 

 

Our Family Crazy Quilts

 

Dreaming a quilt:

Vision unfolds.
Color and pattern 
assemble,
change form,
then settle down; ready to become real.
 
Fabric bought
here and there.
Shades and hues 
are elusive,
having dwelled only in thought.
 
Purchases placed 
in a box beside
templates designed 
late last night.
Inspiration surfaces in that somnolent state.
 
Supplies gathered;
plans sketched on 
an old yellow pad.
I close the lid 
and slip the container beneath the bed ~
 
that secret place
where dreams 
like this wait.
 
© 1998  Anne Johnson
 
 
This quilt is made of cloth and 
      thread
to place upon your little bed.
It's not an heirloom - just to keep,
but to lie upon as you count sheep.
Or perhaps the floor's the perfect place
for a doll and teddy picnic space.
This quilt can be anything you dream -
from Superman's cape to the robe of a queen.
Pretend its a raft adrift at sea,
or just cuddle up when you watch TV.
So use it up and wear it out-
I promise I won't yell or pout,
Just tell me when its days are through,
and I'll make another, just for you.

-- Kathy Sherlock
 

Nothing connects us with our heritage like

holding an heirloom quilt in our hands.