May was a bad month

Please forgive me for not being on here. May was a bad bad month for me. First my Mother-In-Law passed away. she was a wonderful woman and no matter how much we had tried to prepare for this, it threw us for a loop. She passed just days before Mothers Day so you know my Hubby had a hard time on that day. Barb suffered from Dementia and Alzheimer. Not a pretty thing.

Here is a quilt I made to represent my opinion of Alzheimer. As you can see it is threads over threads and what you may or may not see is items behind the threads. At the top the items are hidden well and towards the bottom you can make a few out. The white bottom half is words or phrases that my MIL repeated over and over again during the time I made this quilt. The lines of lettering are shaky like she was and the whole quilt is not square or straight and it has fuzzy yarn around it. I had stated that it was like a brain with Alzheimer's nothing black n white, nothing straight and always frayed around the edges. I had wanted to send it to Ami Simms but it went into an art gallery around here for a little while then I brought it home and it hangs by my door. Maybe it is time to do something constructive with it.

After getting through the rough time with the hubby over the death of his mother things seemed to be settling back into their normal routine, until I get frantic text messages from my oldest son. 'and they haven't been seen since'. Ok that got my attention. Well it seems it was part two of the text and part one was telling me about a tornado in Joplin MO and my niece,his cousin hadn't been heard from. Now for those that don't know me I was born just south of Joplin in Neosho, MO. I was raised just over the state line in Erie, KS. My parents moved back to MO and Joplin has always been a part of my growing up. I have Aunts,Uncles,nieces and a  nephew that call Joplin home. I also have a sister that just lives South of the city limits. So yes this stopped me dead in my tracks. After calling him I turned the TV on and was glued to the coverage for days. Needless to say with the help of Facebook and cell phones we managed to get word that all family members were accounted for and in wonderful shape that first night.  One niece has lost her home but not a scratch on any of them. I had planned a trip home for Memorial weekend, with aging parents I have to make as many trips as I can as often as I can. My two sons went with me and we did drive thru Joplin and any pictures I have seen still can  not really portray the devastation that you see and feel being there.
I am adding this link just in case you would like to give.  All in all my family was blessed to have scrapped by within blocks. I do know that the local quilt store. Sew Neat was demolished in the storm. I had talked about this shop a couple months back from a FNSI. I was doing a quilt and I had bought the ruler and pattern there. Well I have managed to get the borders on this top so I will show it now

I buy so many patterns but rarely make any of them,so this is a monumental occasion that I bought and made with in the same year. I loved Brenda's shop and will truly miss it. I guess she has decided it is time to retire. Sew Neat had the best sale room of any shop I had been too.  I have another quilt that I got the fabric from there but have yet to start it. It has the 'A' word in it. Savin it for a rainy day.






I did manage to get the mystery posted but I sure don't recall ever telling anyone that I did. Here are final sewing instructions. but I still can't find my pic of the finished top. I really need to look for it. Or better yet the the top back out and retake the pic. I have decided that if I ever want to share a pattern I will just post it. You just never know what comes up and being on the net is not high priority when family crisis are calling. I know that I left this mystery hanging at times and had thought that next time I would have everything wrote out and just have to hit post, but have since decided that just putting it all out there would be for the best. So sorry for those that were trying to work along.
I have come to the conclusion that I never finish my quilts for the sole reason I hate to bind. I have a friend that loves to bind so we now are bartering. I long arm for her and she will bind my quilts. Now what will my excuse be now for not getting any thing done.
Well I am sure that I have bored you to death now so I better be off