Long week...

There will be vacation pictures up soon-ish.  We had a great one, and I have several quilt ideas based on our little trip.

However, first I have to deal with the death of my beautiful, intelligent, scheming cat Belanna.

Sounds dramatic, but she was with me for 13 years, about 5 moves, and was in fine health (outwardly) when we left.  We got home, and and hour and a half later she was dead.  It hurts still, but it's getting better.  I still keep thinking I'll see her at the top of the stairs, or hear her on the scratch pad.  Or sitting in the bathroom staring out the window.

Obviously I won't. 

So it may take me a little longer to bounce back.  There are still quilts to be made, and things to be done.

Shay

 

Back to Work...

Back from my great-aunt's funeral.  As expected, a very sad event.  She outlived most of her friends and family, so there were not many people there.  But she was ushered out in the dress and casket she wanted, under a blanket of flowers that she wanted - bright pink flowers and dress - and was buried next to her parents and grandparents.  The graveside ceremony was short and the old graveyard itself quiet and pretty. 

From her I inherited a love of crafting - it comes from all the older members of my family, really, but I remember making things every time I went to see her.  And so I brought home with me fabric and yarn and thread.  When I use them, I will be honoring her memory and the skills and love of crafting that she helped to instill in me.

And maybe in time there will be a quilt for her memory - something that can be shared with other people. 

Stitching and Pain

My great-aunt is dead.  She died at a nice old age, when she decided she was ready to go.  She was done, and she didn't want to be at a nursing home.  So she decided she was ready to go - got a chance to see her house again and make sure everything was fine, and then died.  On Saturday. 

The funeral is Wednesday and the interrment the next day in a town several hours' drive from the funeral.  She's being buried in the town she grew up in, not the town she lived in most of her life.  She'll be buried with family.

She was a crafter - she was ALWAYS making things.  She taught me how to sew by hand and encouraged my sister and I to craft.  And to think.  To be whoever we were - she never had kids of her own, but she was FUN.  We always got to do things when we went to see her.  If we weren't crafting, we'd go to the zoo, or ride the paddleboat on the Brazos River, or... any number of things.

She had my first quilt top quilted for me.   She made me a rail fence quilt in pinks and blues that I still own.  Embroidered her name and the date on the back of it in matching embroidery floss.

I've cried, and will cry more.  But the longest lasting impact is the same one she's always had: be me.  Think.  Be willing to try new things.  Keep learning.  And keep crafting.

So between crying jags, I am still working.  I've solved one quilting issue, and am mentally preparing for the next quilt top.  Because when she looks down from her heaven, she'd smile to see me crafting, and know she helped make me who I am.

Shay