Moving Along

Spring is easing into Summer and I'm wondering where the time has gone!!  Over the last couple of weeks, I've been walking with a close-aged friend, and we lament about our "lost years."  Wasn't I 30 just a few minutes ago?  Now that my youngest is officially a teenager (Will turned 13 in April), I've decided that teenagers suck all the years right outta ya!!  LOL   Since I've lost about 12 years -- which is, incidentally, the exact number of teenager years I've endured through three children (nearly 7 years with Emily, 4.5 with Sam and Will's 1st) -- I think it's entirely reasonable to accuse them of sucking up all my time!!  LOL

We've had a good couple of months.  We vacationed at the beautiful Edisto Island, SC, earlier this month with a couple of days spent in Charleston.
I took lots of books to read and some handwork, too!  The first I've worked on in nearly a year.

Applique...the center block of a pieced quilt that's been on my UFO list for a while.

And Tumbling Blocks...I'm up to about 115 completed 2" blocks...which means I only have about 479-ish more to complete!! :-)  So far it's a charm quilt with no fabrics repeating. I love the look of it, and English paper piecing makes it portable.  Bonnie Hunter's 1" hexies----uh uh! No Way!! :-D  These I can do without making my eyes feel any older than they are!!




We had some additions to the family...all now distributed to other homes. Mr. Stripey -- actually a Mrs! LOL -- was my favorite and she's safely ensconced with my sister, bravely intimidating her passel of dogs!!  She's every bit the tiger she favors!! :-D


Finally, we noted the first anniversary of Sam's passing.  His memorial stone was set, coincidentally, on the day, May 23rd.  The sillouette is actually of Sam; he would love that we captured him in motion, a fitting tribute to be sure.  His epitaph is the summary of his life: "Living to know Him, dying to make Him known." 

Moving on is difficult...One of the hardest parts of grief is noting that Sam will remain forever 17 and our ages and projects and lives will go forward without him.

But life is designed that way.  I once heard a pastor talk about the 23rd Psalm.  Sheep, he said, are always on the move.  They don't linger in one spot over long. And as long as they follow the Shepherd, they are provided for, comforted, healed...even through the valley of the shadow of death.

My cup overflows!!

 

 

Psalm 23

A psalm of David.



Sam's roses, planted just days before he died.

¹ The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not be in want.
² He makes me lie down in green pastures,
he leads me beside quiet waters,
³ he restores my soul.
He guides me in paths of righteousness
for his name’s sake.
⁴ Even though I walk
through the valley of the shadow of death, 
I will fear no evil,
for you are with me;
your rod and your staff,
they comfort me.

⁵ You prepare a table before me
in the presence of my enemies.
You anoint my head with oil;
my cup overflows.
⁶ Surely goodness and love will follow me
all the days of my life,
and I will dwell in the house of the Lord
forever.

Blessings!!





Many, many thanks to those of you who have checked on me from time to time over the last couple of months!!! You'll never know how much and richly you have blessed me!! May God bless you 100-fold!!

Tribute

You can tell by my few blog posts in the last several month that I've not quilted a whole lot. Farmer's Wife blocks for a class I was teaching, memorial quilts that I'd contracted before Sam passed away, the club mystery quilt...That's about it! :-(   Very unusual for someone who usually quilted every single day!!  My friend Jennifer says it's 'cause when I'm sewing at home, I'm usually alone, and too much alone time was resulting in too many tears. True enough, I suppose.

The gals at the local quilt shop talked me into doing Bonnie Hunter's Orca Bay mystery.  I got them into Roll, Roll Cotton Boll last year, so turn about was fair play.  Just rifling through fabric and cutting fabric and sitting with them each Friday to work on it together -- all these seem to have brought some of my quilting joy back!!  And after completing a particularly difficult (for me) memorial quilt for a friend, I tied into Sam's Darlin' Hearts!  And today, I finished the quilt top.

And I'm just in awe.

Not of my work. Far from it.

I'm in awe all over again of the beauty of friendships and heartfelt sympathy and prayers and love that was given to me in the weeks following Sam's death. Who could believe people are so kind! And to me!! As I've looked over the blocks, many are from "close" quilting blog friends. And just as many are from people whose blog paths I've never crossed, or if I have, it was a periferal thing. And yet they cared enough to make a block (or two, or FOUR!) and send them to me in the most difficult days of my life!!

There are no words to properly thank you!! I tried to send cards (I saved every card, envelope and note! :-D), but my tears smeared the ink.   Maybe this small recognition will let you know how grateful I am.  Each name is a link to their blog (if they have one and I know it :-D ) Check them out! They are all amazing!

Row 1

Sharon, Miki, Jacque (1 block of 2 she made!), Stephanie (1 of 2 she made! and I think that's the right blog!) and Ann...

Row 2

Selma Jean, Rhonda (the first block I received!), Cassey, and Rebecca...

Row 3

Debbie (the strawberry fabric was a definite clue! :-D), Sarah, and Teresa...

Row 4

Mary, Crispy (this is the one that sparked the quilt name --  because it made me cry like Charlene Darling on Andy Griffith! :-D), Barb (the sparrow story is amazing!), and Janet...

Row 5

Diane (my Hands 2 Help quilt-for-Romania exchange partner through Sarah's blog), Ann (1 of 4 blocks!!), and LuAnn (who also checked on me through Jeff's deployment! Thank you!!)...

Row 6

Sue (1 of 2 blocks!), Jacque, Ann, and Stephanie...

Row 7

Ann, and Sue, and Cindy Lou :-)...

Row 8

Beth, Tonya,  Paulette, and Staci (this is the only one I'm not sure of...and isn't that a hoot, Stace, since your blog is The Confused Quilter! :-D)...  Correction! :-) The last one on this row is Kate's (Kathleen, below)!! So. is the blue pieced one Staci's!?!?  LOL  Let me know, if you know!)

And Row 9

Kathy,  Ann, Robbie, Kathleen, and Karen.

Many of the blocks came from quilters who participated in Sarah's Hands 2 Help challenge.  Such generous gals!! Thank you so much!

I think the quilt top is just stunning!! I have a couple of quilters in mind to complete it, and then it's snuggle time. :-)

This is the first of three pieced quilts I'll make in Sam's memory -- I'll be piecing one with his boxers :-D (there are 24 pair of them!! :-D) in the next couple of weeks, and I have a bunch of blue fat quarters that my quilt club gave me to use in another. 

I received a quilt from Mary at Quilt Hollow, and it's already a favorite. She won the quilt top, then quilted it and sent it to me to bind.  What a blessing!!

And then I have his t-shirts and other memorabilia to place in quilts for Emily and Will. Sweet!!

Philippians 1:3-8 expresses some of what I feel for you all. :-)  I like the Message translation...

Every time you cross my mind, I break out in exclamations of thanks to God. Each exclamation is a trigger to prayer. I find myself praying for you with a glad heart. I am so pleased that you have continued on in this with us, believing and proclaiming God's Message, from the day you heard it right up to the present. There has never been the slightest doubt in my mind that the God who started this great work in you would keep at it and bring it to a flourishing finish on the very day Christ Jesus appears.

 It's not at all fanciful for me to think this way about you. My prayers and hopes have deep roots in reality. You have, after all, stuck with me all the way from the time I was thrown in jail, put on trial, and came out of it in one piece. All along you have experienced with me the most generous help from God. He knows how much I love and miss you these days. Sometimes I think I feel as strongly about you as Christ does!

Thank you for being God's grace to me.  Thank you for giving from the heart.  Thank you for, as was said of Sam, loving "without filters."  Thank you for being a part of my finding my quilt joy again!  May you be blessed  a hundred fold!!

Blessings,

Angels, Blessings and Christmas

It's hard to believe that another Christmas is here...another year we've been blessed to celebrate the birth of Christ, the gift of Hope to the world, the promise of abundant life to all who receive Him.

I find myself drawn to the story of God made flesh -- even though it is old and familiar, this year it seems amazing to me again in a way I hadn't experienced in a while.  Perhaps because I'm remembering the birth of my own children.

We've been singing a song at church this month by Chris Tomlin called Hallowed Manger Ground.  The last verse begins, "The Son of God, here born to bleed, a crown of thorns would pierce His brow..."  And I wonder that He came at all, knowing all that was in store for Him.

And I'm struck that another son -- my Sam -- was also known by God, and sent by Him, and all that has transpired this year with his homegoing and our loss....none of it was a surprise to God, and He is still working a plan, the fruit of which I have yet to see.  Hard to fathom! Hard to understand. Hard to take, sometimes. :-) And yet, as Mary must have understood, we have to trust God.

 

I guess I've cried just about every day.  But blessings abound.  Some new angels on the  mantle...

"Remember" from a friend at church. So appropriate, so perfect.   Just to the left of Remember is the "Angel of Summer" that Mary at Quilt Hollow sent me last Christmas because Jeff was deployed and she knew there'd not be much under the tree for me. :-)  What good friends!!

Another dear friend gave me "Heart of Gold," also a Willow Tree figurine...  just the perfect representation of our Sam.

Sam's Boot Camp friends gave us ornaments from a race he ran last winter called the "Jingle Bell Run." :-D  Last year's race photo becomes the current year's trophy ornament...and the Boot Campers checked out the engraving, contacted the company and added Sam's name to it for them and for us to have as keepsakes.  Awesome! :-)

Sam is number 110--'bout fourth in the start, and he looks cold, but not as cold as those guys without shirts! LOL

So many changes this year.  I look back over all that I've written here in the last several months...It feels like eons ago.  It feels like yesterday!!  I'm in awe at what God has done and is doing. 

Ephesians 3:14-21 (The Message)

^14-19My response is to get down on my knees before the Father, this magnificent Father who parcels out all heaven and earth. I ask him to strengthen you by his Spirit—not a brute strength but a glorious inner strength—that Christ will live in you as you open the door and invite him in. And I ask him that with both feet planted firmly on love, you'll be able to take in with all followers of Jesus the extravagant dimensions of Christ's love. Reach out and experience the breadth! Test its length! Plumb the depths! Rise to the heights! Live full lives, full in the fullness of God.
^20-21God can do anything, you know—far more than you could ever imagine or guess or request in your wildest dreams! He does it not by pushing us around but by working within us, his Spirit deeply and gently within us.

Glory to God in the church!
Glory to God in the Messiah, in Jesus!
Glory down all the generations!
Glory through all millennia! Oh, yes!  

Just like the angels sang to the shepherds on that first Christmas morn!
"Glory to God in the Highest!"

May every blessing of Christmas be yours today and in the New Year!

Never Alone

I'm finding it hard this just-turned Thanksgiving morning to find words...

This is our first without Sam, and it surely feels like something vital is missing...laughter, noise, and that greatest of all holiday accessories, the teenage-boy-eating-machine!!  :-)  I've dreaded the holidays this year, knowing these "firsts" will be difficult. Funny...we anticipate with such impatience the firsts of life's beginning. First teeth, first steps, first words.  Not so much those firsts of life's end.

I spent some time earlier this evening looking at photos from last Thanksgiving...

We traveled to Mississippi with "adopted" family -- ties forged between children and mothers who share adventures and hobbies, and time and treasures. What a blessed, sweet time we had together! 

And I find myself thankful for friends and family and times that can never be recaptured but can always be remembered. 

And thankful for here and now...

And all that is to come.

As I shed a few tears tonight, a Word came to me from Joshua...

The book of Joshua in the Old Testament begins, "After the death of Moses..." and God gives a charge to Joshua as he is to be the leader of Israel.  "Be strong and courageous" God tells him, three different times!

The final time He says, "Have I not commanded you?  Be strong and courageous.  Do not be terrified; do not be discouraged, for the LORD your God will be with you wherever you go."  (Joshua 1: 9 NIV)

Perhaps I can find words, after all.

Thank You, Lord, for so many blessings.  Beautiful children that You entrused to me and Jeff, one who has already accomplished all You purposed for him and who is with You now!, a wonderful home, memories that are not only precious to this momma's heart, but include testimony of Your goodness and mercy and what You can do with a life given to You.

And thank You for Your Presence and Your promises to never leave nor forsake.  How well I know You keep Your word!!

May God richly bless YOU this Thanksgiving!!

Blessings,

Memory Eye Candy

The weekend is coming! The weekend is coming!! :-)
And it's gonna be a good one!!
I've gotten several things done this week, and I'm as pleased as punch about it! Nothing like actually finishing something (I am, after all, Queen Starts-a-lot) to make me feel that I'm not THE most useless person on the planet right now!

AND! I'm getting company! My friend Jennifer and her boys are coming up for a special Memorial Run for my Sam...more about that in a minute....

Look what I've done!! :-D
This is a "Little Jo" pattern from Jo Morton. I've had it pieced for a while, and finally machine quilted it on my Bernina.  I used the walking foot on the 4-patches, and did some free-motion "L's" and "U's" in the sashing strips and some curly waves in the borders.  I used matching thread, of course! So you can't see my blunders, but I'm thrilled with the finish!


I also managed to complete two t-shirt quilts I had in the works for a friend.  One is bound (yippee!) and the other is at the quilter.









They are for members of the same family, so they are similar, but uniquely their own with their memories represented in those wonderful t-shirts.  The mom asked for quotations on her son's quilt.  It was fun figuring out how to do the letters, and they turned out really cool....

So much so that I used them on Jennifer's quilt -- which is actually finished in time for her visit here this weekend!!  I've called the quilt "The Best of Times" -- and it is representative of the many places we went and memories our families made together.  I wanted the quilt to be a kind of scrap book of our time together.

A dear friend of mine, Mary Greene, made a scrap book for me of Sam...She is such an artist!! Look at some of the pages she created:

The rest of the album is just as beautiful, like memory eye-candy!  My quilt doesn't approach Mary's kind of artistry, but at least it brings to mind many of our adventures together.  We'll reminisce while they are here.

Also this weekend, Cumberland Homeschool Athletic Teams (CHAT :-) is hosting the Sam Casada Trail Blazer Memorial Run.  This is the organization through which Sam and Jennifer's boys got to compete in cross country and basketball.  Jennifer and her boys are coming up to participate in the run and spend some time with us.

A local girl drew a likeness of Sam for the run's t-shirt.

It's gonna be a great weekend!

The book of Proverbs tells us that "The memory of the righteous will be a blessing, but the name of the wicked will rot."  (Proverbs 10:7 NIV)
Love it!!

At the end of the story of Esther, that brave queen who intervened for her people in the Old Testament, the writer admonishes us, "These days should be remembered and observed in every generation, by every family..." (Esther 9:28 NIV)

How are you making memory eye candy?  Will your memory be a blessing?

Blessings!

More than I Deserve!

I'm winding down a couple of t-shirt quilts I'd committed to do for others and looking forward to moving on to other projects! :-)  I have another few memorial quilts in the works for people, but they don't have strict deadlines so I can be more leisurely about getting them done.

I've been taking a few minutes each evening to work on the binding of this quilt:

I got it in the mail earlier this week from Mary at Quilt Hollow.  She actually won the quilt top from Kelly at Cottage Charm Quilt's blog, Charming Chatter! 

Mary quilted it with her fabulous quilting (she always uses the most beautiful thread, too!) and sent it along to me with the binding attached, but not finished.  Her note said that she hoped I would sit on my porch and think beautiful thoughts of Sam while doing the hand work.  And that's exactly what I've been doing, a little each evening.

Quilts are always comfort -- but this one will hold a special place in my heart, as you might imagine!! I'm gonna have a whole collection of "Sam" quilts between those made with his clothing, my heart blocks, the blue fat quarters my club gave me in his memory, and this beautiful piece.  It's just so very humbling to be the recipient of such generosity!!

Another wonderful mailbox blessing was the 41 yards (!!!!!) that I won from Vicky at LAQuilter.  Beautiful florals and pastels -- colors that I don't have any of in my stash. 

You may have seen my stash or photos of it here or at Stash Manicure when I've guested over there.  I don't need fabric, but I do love fabric! :-D   And I've recently been stretching my color palette beyond the repros and Thimbleberries into lights and brights -- and I honestly don't have a clue how to use them! LOL  I'm starting out simply, though.... We'll see how it goes.

Some friends of ours here in town asked us over to pick blueberries.

We had a rich, wonderful time with them and collected nearly 3 gallons of berries.  I found out later that they are running $20/gallon from pick-your-own patches!! Such phenemenal generosity from Jeff and Vicky.  After grazing over our buckets for a day, I still managed to freeze 10 quarts!!

Our Will had a fun time....

Even more so when he nabbed the camera for himself!

I told Mary that one humbling Biblical truth I keep encountering is that we always reap more than we sow.

Scripture tells us,

⁶ Remember this: Whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows generously will also reap generously. ⁷ Each man should give what he has decided in his heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver. ⁸ And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work.  (2 Corinthians 9:6-8)

I think of myself as a generous person; I don't claim ownership of a lot (I've even understood that my family -- my children, in particular -- is just on loan from God), so it's always been easy for me to give.

But what I have received in this past month since Sam died is way, way, way more than I deserve, way out of proportion to what I've ever done for anyone else.

 The writer of Hebrews tells us, "Let us approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need." (Hebrews 4:16)

Just when I need it, His grace is there, administered to me by your loving hands!!

Thank you so very much!
Thank You, Lord, so very much!!

Blessings,