Train 'em young

     I am gifted with a granddaughter (age 7) who loves to color and draw. She asked me to draw some flowers with her on the driveway for spring. I am always stocked with chalk.

Hers

Mine

     Then she asked me if it was a quilt back, how could it be designed, so we drew these out. B is for back. Background fabric colors and design added. All her idea.

x
     Finally, she designed a front and now expects me to make it. F is for front. Yikes. How does she do that so easily and I sweat over graph paper?

The Bonus Year

      I think we are all familiar with the term "Bonus Triangles" which means the saving and using of pieces cut off stitch and flip blocks. In my case, I had a Bonus Year. Last February 7th, 2018, I experienced a severe, heart stopping, heart attack. Out of the blue. No normal heart attack symptons- just a stabbing pain in the throat. 
     Women many times do not have the normal symptoms. A high percentage of women never survive their first heart attack. I found that out when I signed up for cardiac rehab and asked why were so few women attending. Three times a week I do a hard workout for over an hour. Takes a chunk out of my day and I don't like it, but I am still here and stronger. 
     Please, if anything strikes you out of the blue and seems very strong and uncharacteristic, get help. I had no chest pain, shortness of breath, nausea, arm pain, or dizziness, etc. Just that knife edge pain. My town paramedics rescued me and Dr. Vijay Iyer from Gates Vascular Institute saved me via stents. I was spared by God for this past year. 
     When I was in the hospital, my then 7 year old grandson made me a card. He knows how much I love my vintage machines and quilting. This was the inside of the card, the side opposite his writing:

      You can see the whole card and the post with fabric that Vicki sent me not knowing the quilt on the card here. 
      Anyways, a year later, I had not started on the quilt because I was afraid to mess up, not knowing how to start, blah, blah, blah. Yesterday, I pinned all the fabric on the wall, added more hand dyes, and started with a loose plan. I was certain that if I started to draw it out on graph paper, I would lose momentum and have it look rather frozen. It doesn't have to be any particular size or fit, so I started cutting 2" strips. If sewed straight, it did not seem like a kid's design, so I had to figure out how to cut things a bit wonkier. Hard for me. I think I finally have it going well. Ethan drew four stars on it and I am debating how to handle that. I have to include them!

Laying it out

Getting it sewn

     The last photo to share is my hand. People have been posting hands lately. This photo shows the two incision marks that still show now from the two times I had to have the stents placed (4 days apart). 

     I look at it a lot and give thanks for the bonus year. Now if I could just get some serious quilting and painting progress going gangbusters, it would be even better.