Reveal: The Christmas Commission

I was asked several months ago by good friend Devin to take his daughter's t-shirts and make a quilt with them. Now I've made a lot of t-shirt quilts, and this one would be just another of the same - except that it wouldn't be the same. You see, his daughter is Alexis, my former student who died of cancer in February of 2013. Sharon and I made a flannel quilt for her during her illness, which you can read about here.

And just this year, that flannel quilt needed some mending as Heather, Devin's wife and Alexis's mother, had been using it since Alexis's passing. What was meant to provide comfort to Alexis during her cancer treatments has ended up providing comfort to Heather in the wake of her daughter's death.

One of the blocks; my personal favorite; her sweet smile.

So this wasn't just any t-shirt quilt. No, indeed. Over the course of a 30-year teaching career, a handful of students stand out for one reason or another. Probably because she was such an avid reader, Alexis and I just clicked. And our friendship lasted beyond her freshman year when I had her in my class; we remained close afterwards as she was a moving force for a little literary club we formed.

Alexis was quite active in high school and had such a varied support group through her illness, that t-shirts were plentiful. I ended up making a quilt with 25 blocks - a genuine whopper, I tell you. I reduced the width of the sashing strips to keep the size manageable, and used smaller borders, too, but it still ended up ginormous.

Heather with her beaming smile displays her new quilt.

A high school t-shirt - '08 Homecoming.

And now that both Devin and Heather (did I mention that they were both my students, too, back in the '80s?) have opened the Christmas gift, I have been given the all-clear to share it here. Devin requested the quilt as a gift he planned to give to Heather for Christmas. This commission took an unusual twist, though, because he wanted to be surprised on Christmas, too. Really, the only questions I asked him during the making of this quilt is what color should I use for borders, sashing and backing. The answer was orange, obviously, which works great. When I handed off the quilt to them, I had it pretty-well wrapped in a gift bag with tissue paper all around. They saved it for Christmas and opened it together. His texts to me as well as his Facebook and Instagram posts have been so sweet. They really love the quilt and that makes me so very happy. I admit that I had teary eyes more than once during the months I worked on this, and even this week as I heard from Devin.

All along, I was very careful not to post any telling pictures, but I did drop occasional hints. Here are a few pics I posted related to this project.

Devin and Heather, it was an honor to be asked to make this quilt for you. You know how special Alexis was to me; few students have the special spark that she had. She will always occupy a special place in my heart.

Happy Quilting, Friends!

Needed Repairs

A couple days ago I got a call from Devin, asking me to repair a quilt. Now, this is not some ordinary, generic quilt; this quilt is a special one, and you have seen it here already.

Back in 2012, Sharon and I made a flannel comfort quilt for our former student and avid book lover, Alexis, as she was battling a very aggressive cancer. If you click here, you can read about our planning the quilt. And you can click here to read a post about our making it. This post is the one about Alexis's passing. Sharon and I both had a special relationship with Alexis when she was a high school student, as she was instrumental in helping us start a Literary Club at CHS. She and a handful of other students were faithful participants in our little club between 2005-2009. She was always so eager to read new things, and share her love of reading with us and with fellow students.

Devin tells me that since Alexis's death, his wife Heather uses the quilt every day. Oh how happy that makes me!! A mother's gotta' have some comfort, too! And if it needs a bit of mending, then I am happy to do it. After being so lovingly used and laundered, the binding stitches have begun to come undone. Since the quilt gets a lot of use, I think I will repair by machine, rather than by hand, so that there will be more sturdiness all around.

I will have this back in Heather's arms by Saturday - DH and Devin have a breakfast date, and this will be going along for delivery.

Happy Quilting, Friends!

A Quilt for Alexis

Life sends some giant bumps into our lives every now and then. My former student, 20-year-old Alexis is dealing with a very serious one right now. She had surgery yesterday to remove an epithelial sarcoma. I have not heard any news from her family or friends, so I am just praying for the best until I do hear something. She has pretty-much been on my mind 24/7 since Monday, when I last spoke to Alexis on facebook. She is being so brave, bless her heart. She has lots of faith, has a strong church family, and support beyond even what she knows. Her dad told me they've heard from complete strangers about prayers being said for them. What strength that must give them!

Sharon also had Alexis as a student, so together we are teaming up to make a comfort quilt for her. The simple 6.5" square. We attacked my flannel stash, pulling out lots of pinks. Sharon then searched her own stash and did the same. Our plan was to sew this on Monday when we met for our day of sewing, but I was still sick and had to miss; so we have our squares all cut and ready to go for next Monday.

In the lower left corner is a stack of 3.5" squares. I thought that we might consider sprinkling in some 4-patch blocks here and there, just to give a bit of interest to the quilt. If we decide not to, then I've got a nice stack of squares ready for a different project.

Alexis is the second young person close to me to have a cancer diagnosis in recent months.  My former colleague, Diana's daughter, Ellen, has just been given the all-clear pronouncement for her non-Hodgkins lymphoma. Ellen, 24, was diagnosed last spring, so Sharon (also Diana's colleague) and I got to work on a flannel quilt for her.

Remember this? Sharon actually did all the work on this; the sewing had to follow a certain pattern (obviously), so it was just easier keeping is straight with one seamstress on the job. I don't know if we will do the same pattern for Alexis; probably not, since we are relying so heavily on our stashes, we will most likely have to just do a random, scrappy quilt.

Think how often we complain about all sorts of things in our lives; then think about those who have much bigger and scarier battles to fight.

Happy Quilting, Friends!