There’s no sugar coating it, our family has had a full dose of life reality lately, so it wasn’t a mistake that I pulled this bit of happy colored sunshine out of the pile of unfinished tops to quilt.
I needed some mind occupation.
It seems that each quilt has a memory of its making somewhere along all its steps, and not in a bad way, but quilting and binding Happy Snowballed Sunshine will remind me for a time of my father-in-law John passing.
This quilt and its association with this particular time reminded me of quilting Supernova. Supernova was the quilt that I was working on four years ago yesterday, the same day John got his kidney transplant.
There were tears of joy quilted into that quilt and a few sad ones for the donor’s family too. That generous lady knew that in her passing she could gift a family some of those ‘best of times’ as we call them.
And she did.
But quilting this also made me thankful that I have creative things to do that occupy my mind when I need them.
It also solidified something that seems so obvious, but I’d never really thought about it. My love for fun and funky color combos that lift my mood to happy when I see them, even if the times don’t match.
And the prints that are hard to cut into? Now is the time to use them.
I’ll gift this bit of happy at some point. This quilt hasn’t found its person yet, but that baby will add another dimension to the quilt memory.
(thanks Sounders FC instagram for photo)
And for my happy memory I’ve been reminding myself to remember the healthy John. The John that would sit on my couch drinking a martini telling me funny stories.
He would have liked my happy quilt and he definitely loved sunshine;)