Legacy

While visiting my parents for Easter this past weekend, my mom gave me two quilt tops pieced by my great grandmother. If I had to venture a guess, these quilts are at least 30 years old. My great-grandmother passed away in the early '90s. I have no recollection of her ever sewing when I knew her, but she did. She gave my mom the quilt tops, knowing that she sewed and hoping she could finish them. My mother, who doesn't sew much anymore, passed them onto me. When we arrived home, I sort of laid the quilts out and stared at them in awe. There is so much history there.

Sometimes, in between work and school and house stuff, I begin to wonder why I even try to squeeze out a moment here and a moment there to attempt my creative projects. But, when I see these quilts, I am reminded that I am a part of a larger craft legacy. One that includes talented women and men who take out time from their schedules to sand wood or sew purses or string beads. On a smaller scale, I am a part of a lineage of talented ladies in my own family. Women who raised children and cooked meals and hoarded scraps of fabrics and sewed quilts. Some out of necessity, I'm sure, and some because it was just a small, simple way of keeping their creative minds sharp.

And tomorrow I will photograph those amazing quilt tops and post pictures here. I've never tried making bias binding before, but I am going to make my own binding, and finish off the little works of art that my great-grandmother began so many years ago.