grace grits and gardening

ramblings from an arkansas farm girl

Q is for Quilt

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quilted by John’s Grandmother Siebenmorgen
Our home is filled with vintage quilts, 
each a beautiful piece of artwork, 
each as unique as the woman behind the craft. 
Within the tight stitches, family history lives, 
thoughts and feelings woven into cotton, 
conversations trapped between layers of fabric. 
Blankets of love to keep us warm. 
Old and frayed, more precious than gold.
quilted by Pauline Boerner (my mother-in-law)
quilted by my aunts –
Virgie Johnson Stubbs & Rena Johnson Kennedy
Turtle Quilt
quilted by Nana (Frances Johnson Creecy)

talya


When we make something it holds more than just the materials we use. – Miss Henrietta, Flights of Fancy by Crow Johnson Evan
Musical Pairing:

I’ll Be Seeing You, Rosemary Clooney

P.S. all these quilts were made in Arkansas:)

Blogging my way through the alphabet…
A to Z April Blog Challenge. Q is for Quilt.

Memory Quilt

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“When we make something it holds more than just the materials we use.” This is what Miss Henrietta says in Flights of Fancy, Crow Johnson Evan’s book of short stories, essays and novellas. As Miss Henrietta weaves a memory rug, she explains only good things can be discussed while making it. Bad thoughts mustn’t be braided into the rug.

I love this idea. Miss Henrietta put into words what I’ve always thought. I love old things with a history and a soul and a memory.

 

When I was eight years old, Nana made me a quilt. My turtle quilt. If our house was on fire or hit by an unlikely tsunami, it would be one of the first things I would grab. If our house was attacked by zombies or aliens, I would hide under it.

For forty-two years and two days, the quilt has been with me. It traveled from the farm in Arkansas to college in Waco to Dallas where it now lives. It’s my Linus blanket.

my memory quilt

I remember the imposing quilt frame set up in her living room. Although I don’t know exactly what thoughts filled Nana’s mind as she hand stitched the fabric scraps together, I have a good idea…
Sunday School lesson…
the cotton crop…
Staci and me…
Momma…
Uncle Rex and Frances…
what pie to cook for Papa that night…
the weather…
her sisters and brothers…
cleaning house…
the irises growing around the trees in the front yard…Those thoughts now live as memories sewed into my quilt.
Because Nana never uttered a bad word, the quilt cloaks me in blessed assurance, the tune she always whistled.
Grace Grits and Gardening
Musical Pairing:
Blessed Assurance, Alan Jackson

(lyrics written in 1873 by blind hymn writer Fanny J. Crosby to the music written by Phoebe P. Knapp)

Wild Christmas Day Hike

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Wild by Cheryl Strayed, my Christmas Day review
I spent Christmas Day hiking the Pacific Crest Trail. An 1,100 mile journey from the Mojave Desert through the High Sierras to Washington State. Technically, author Cheryl Strayed did the hiking, I just went along for the trek, reading her book Wild cover to cover lying on the couch. Although I felt I was with her, I was comfy underneath a quilt. And not just any quilt, my turtle quilt, made by Nana when I was eight years old.

 

As the outside temperature plummeted, I read.  A pounding thunderstorm gradually evolved to snow with quarter-sized flakes, the sort that float dreamily to the ground and pile up all afternoon. With Annabelle curled at my feet, a fire nearby and steaming coffee, I luxuriated in a perfectly peaceful Christmas Day.Yes, Dallas had a White Christmas. That in itself was a miracle.

With no hiking or backpacking experience, Wildis the fascinating memoir of one young woman’s journey to rebuild her self-destructive life one step at a time. She faced intense heat and record snowfall, black bears, rattlesnakes and injuries. Somewhere along the trail, while confronting her personal demons, she found herself.
I was mesmerized.I can’t imagine pushing myself to those limits.

As humans we are rarely alone. Not really. We are surrounded by people and media and music and traffic. But when we are alone with only ourselves, we think and grow.

As I read the book I tried to remember a time I was truly alone. In fifty years the only experience I could semi-compare to Wild occured one day during the summer I spent in Tokyo. I traveled alone to a neighboring village. Changing trains multiple times and never sure I was on the right train, I thought I might never make it back to my group. With only one semester of Japanese, I was inept reading and speaking the language.  I remember sitting on the train surrounded by strangers thinking no one in the entire world knows where I am right at this moment. I didn’t know where I was at that moment. (Before iPhones and GPS and checking-in on Facebook…)
 
It was empowering, although a bit frightening.
talyaGrace Grits and Gardening
Farm. Food. Garden. Life.

Musical Pairing:

Lou Reed, Walk on the Wild Side

Food. Farm. Garden. Life.

THANKS FOR READING!