Last February my
Chicago Modern Quilt Guild devoted its meeting to the
Alzheimer's Art Quilt Initiative. I was amazed at the quiltlets that my guildsters created.
Eileen's moved me so that I had to buy hers. My mom's and my family's struggle with her Alzheimer's is a path that must be walked one day at a time. No medications have been useful, and she needs constant supervision. I don't know whether it's medical research or social assistance that is needed more, but I responded on a pretty deep emotional level to this grass-roots fund-raising organization AAQI.
So I have jumped into volunteering for the AAQI organization. My small role among a small sturdy army of volunteers involves scanning each group-made quiltlet and emailing a quality photo that can be used for the AAQI website.
Sounds easy. But of course there were hardware issues. My laptop and the wide-format scanner needed several hours of warming up to one another. Now, they are friends. And the software is PaintShopPro - not impossible to use but certainly almost beyond my capabilities. My shoulder-companion in this venture is my quiltster Eileen - working with her is a joy. So far we have spent 8 difficult hours working on this new software, and we have finally cracked it. We will need to spend two days a week in hot pursuit of the boxes of donated quiltlets that are lining the studio stairs.
Over 11,000 quiltlets have been donated to AAQI, and the amount of money raised has come from the emotional depths of so many women, all of whom have been impacted by Alzheimer's. I'm feeling good about this past week.
This quilt, based on Weeks and Bill's Sea Glass is labor intensive. When I was teaching research papers, the kids were terrified. And I reassured them that we would do it step by step and bit by bit until the paper came together. That's exactly the kind of thinking I've had to use with this construction. The directions in their book Quilts Made Modern are specific and designed to reduce bending and curving in these looooooong vertical seams. Eve though I've only done a couple - see the right side of the photo - their construction method is working beautifully.
Steady and slow wins the race - or finishes the quilt.
The long strip sets in the previous post were cut into 6.675" blocks and then joined to another block. These 6.75" blocks of varying lengths are now being cut into 2.25" strips. The background I'm thinking of using is similar to the color of this work table. I think I'm beginning to see this although I have no idea what size this quilt will be.
In Jasper, Alberta, there was a charming quilt shop, Stytchen Thyme. And of course I had to buy something there. The US is where almost all quilt stuff comes from. So the best I could do is buy something that "reads" Canadian Rockies. I bought a jelly roll of fabrics by Moda (which interestingly enough was manufactured in South Korea). Then the creative angst of what to do with this began. Finally I decided to pattern this new project after the cover photo on Quilts Made Modern by Weeks Ringle and Bill Kerr. Their quilt is Sea Glass - mine will be Rocky Woods.
My sense of proportion isn't fine-tuned, and I'm really leaning heavily on these directions. This project will also be a continuation of my attempt to work light - the background for these rich colors is a Kona bone or white - still to be determined. It always feels good to get a project underway!
Fellow Chicago Modern Quilt Guild member Jacquie Gering just published her first book, along with Katie Pederson, Quilting Modern. Jacquie is doing a book signing at a shop in the city. AND this shop, The Needle Shop is in Bucktown, the neighborhood my husband grew up in. So I have my copy of Jacquie's book, neatly packed in an over-the-shoulder shopping bag I just finshed, and we're ready for John's blast from his past. 
