Grandma's Quilts

The first four days of April were pretty unremarkable. Normal everyday kind of days filled with lunch-packing, laundry, baseball practices and bedtimes. But in the early morning hours of Thursday April 5th we received a couple of emails that would change not only our month, but our lives. Erik's mom, who was diagnosed with cancer in March of 2009, was not doing well. Despite an amazing and fairly healthy three years her health was declining. Quickly. Dad wasn't sure he could care for her anymore. He was worried. By that afternoon test results revealed that there was nothing more doctors could do. Kathy had "days to weeks" left to live. To say the news was devastating doesn't even begin to describe it. It was way more than that.

By Friday evening Erik was in Utah, all seven siblings gathered to say goodbye to their amazing mom and support their dad. By Monday evening she was gone, a peaceful passing with her children and husband by her side. It was so hard to be here. So hard to not get to say my goodbye.

Somehow Erik flew back home to us; we made it back to Utah; we went to a viewing and a funeral; we cried and hugged; we missed school and work and games and contests. It's all a blur. It was sad and hard, but beautiful and inspiring as well. No matter how many times I've tried to write about the whole experience the words just get in the way of the feelings that were there. Feelings of love and gratitude for a woman who loved me, inspired me and taught me.

One of the last things I did before heading home to Texas was go into Kathy's sewing room. The sewing machine on the table was ready for quilt blocks that would never be pieced together by her hands. The iron was cold, waiting for seams that would never be pressed. Fabric was folded and stacked in the closet, each piece picked out with her hands and her heart; with love for a specific person, a specific project. The blue and yellow scraps from a birthday apron she once made me caught my eye and I collected them, as well as a few other pieces that I wanted to help me remember. It was my time, my way to say my goodbye.

In the month that I've been home I've thought a lot about fabric and patterns. I've looked closely at each of the quilts she made for Erik and our children for their blessings and baptisms and birthdays and pondered the thought and love that went into each and every stitch. Nothing Kathy ever did, in quilting or in life, was simply random or aimless. She lived, loved and served with a purpose. Her life was patterned after her Savior and pieced together with seams of righteousness that were a part of her life since childhood.

Her love and righteous example, like her quilts, are heirlooms that I will always cherish. My children may not, at least not right now, understand what each of these quilts mean. But I do. And for that I am grateful.

(Some of our "grandma quilts" L-R: Erik - with his baseball jerseys, a BYU shirt, and his baby Dodgers shirt & blanket; Jacob - designed by grandpa and grandma with BYU, Dodgers and Rangers logos; Amanda - Fun 1930's era fabrics and appliqued flowers - so Amanda; Shawn - the BYU and sports quilt she delivered in person in February - her last trip; Mason - a fun parade of African animals, hand quilted by Grandma on her mission; Ashley - beautiful floral fabrics and pieced star and diamond blocks; Ryan - a great African print. I remember her telling me that the orange just made her think of her Ryan.)