PATCHWORK AIDS RECOVERY BY STELLA HEWITT

For someone who has the now permanent condition of ‘senior moments’, people of a certain age will know just where I am coming from! You know the kind of thing, many lost hours wandering from room to room searching for the invisible glasses, what am I in here for? the glazed expression of the mildly befuddled etc. – maddening to say the least. And yet – 9.20 on the 8th December 1998 is as clear in my mind now as it was then. Why? Well that was the moment my life changed for ever.

At that very moment in time I was involved in a car crash and nothing was ever to be the same again; not the person I was, nor the life I was leading. Following a period of initial trauma I was forced to embark on the process of recovery. Unknown to me, as I set out with the aid of my Occupational Therapist to learn how to live my radically new life, that that was when my future addiction to patchwork and quilting really took a hold. Prior to the crash I had been a fairly active person. Amongst the many things I enjoyed and loved had been long distance walking. Nothing gave me greater pleasure than getting up in the hills and mountains away from everything. “Well” said the OT, “you are going to have to find some new challenges to fill your life; a mountain can be anything in your mind that you want to conquer.”

I had to begin the systematic return to mobility and it was suggested that drawing around hexagons on card and cutting them out would help to get my hands mobile and keep my mind occupied. It certainly did that and I churned out piles of the things with no thought as to what I was going to do with them next. I remembered seeing a picture of a cushion made of scraps of fabric hexagons that I had really liked, so the next step was obvious. Could I do the same thing with fabric? Great idea except the only fabric I had at that time was a bag of scraps that had been hanging around in the cupboard for years. Bits of clothing, leftovers from dressmaking and household projects, stuff that I thought would come in handy for something one day. I had no idea at the time, but I was sure they would. Was I a closet quilter all along and was this it coming out?

The Long Road Back had begun. I worked away cutting fabric hexagons and sewing them onto the cardboard; I began to join them and a subsequent pile of assorted flowers grew. At that time I had no clue that I was carrying out the process of English patchwork. The early stitching was clumsy and difficult and reflects the battle with the pain. But as time went on both I and the standard of flowers improved steadily. It also dawned on me as I built up my pile that there were a host of good associations in the scraps of fabrics that I was using. Every bit was linked to a person, place or event in my life and gave me a real feeling of comfort. Some of the fabrics date from the 1960s and I remember a school dress, Grandad’s shirt, bathroom curtains – the list was endless and the lovely memories a treasure trove.

My journey into my new life eventually brought me to Malvern, the flowers remained packed away in a box as I still didn’t know what to do with them. Now living on my own in a new place, I decided to try something I had never done before to get to know people. I joined the Malvern Quilters and I attended a talk where the speaker showed her version of a ‘Granny’s Garden’ quilt. Eureka! I went home that evening with some idea of what to do next, but no idea of how to design a quilt or create the right layout – I don’t know if I’m any better now! But I made a start. I randomly joined the flowers together until I ran out of them. Then I added bits of some old blue curtaining until the project was much too big to be the cushion in my original plan – you see how the addiction creeps up on you? Meanwhile at quilt group meetings I was struggling with phrases like ‘fat quarter’ and ‘block’ (which really meant a square) – a whole new language which needed translating. Learning this skill was going to be my new mountain to climb. Then a friend passed on some of her old ‘Patchwork & Quilting’ magazines and some light began to dawn on this other world.

I eventually ended up with something that would cover my bed. To the ‘quilt police’ it was not a quilting work of art but with all its history and memories sewn in, it had become a very precious item to me. It was also the story of my recovery; weak and clumsy stitches had steadily grown into some finer and stronger work fit for the purpose. However, the thought of layering and quilting made me very nervous – I was not ready to face that challenge yet and I was not convinced of the quality of what I had made. So I approached Carol at ‘Finishing Touches’ and asked her if she could help me make a silk purse out of what was very much to me at that time – a sow’s ear! With her short arm quilter and her expertise the ‘Long Road Back’ was beginning to look like something respectable enough to have on show. I set to with the binding and eventually my quilt was finished - after nine years in the making

If you have a patchwork piece you would like quilted, Carol Davidson of Finishing Touches, will be happy to discuss it with you. She has a short arm Gammell Machine, which means she can quilt up to 100" x 105" and offers pantograph designs or custom quilting. Contact her on 01926 512503 or caroldsew@yahoo.co.uk.