Merry Christmas

Wishing you and your families a very Merry Christmas from Snowy Wisconsin!

Memory Quilt

I recently saw this post on Annie O's blog and it reminded me of a quilt that I finished in June of 2007.

This is one of 5 memorial quilts I made in 2006 & 2007. This quilt was made especially with my mother-in-law in mind. She had lost her husband after a long battle with scleroderma a few years prior. Most of the plaids in this quilt are scraps from my father-in-law's flannel shirts. I found the pattern "Diamonds Are Forever" in American Patchwork and Quilting's April 2004 issue. I designed and added the floral border using a needle turn applique technique.

This is the first quilt I made with complicated machine quilting designs. I mimicked the floral applique designs with quilted stitches on the two borders that did not have applique.

The picture above is of the large pocket I added so the quilt could be folded up on itself and used as a pillow.

All of my father-in-law's shirts had to have pockets to hold his reading glasses. I saved a few of these pockets and used them for the labels on each of the quilts.

This project brought back so many memories. Each Christmas my husband, his brothers and his father would get new matching flannel shirts. I wish I had the pictures to show you the guys hamming it up for the camera in their matching shirts.

A Trip to Our Local Post Office

Greetings from our local post office in Richland Center. I love taking trips to this post office. I get a chance to step back in time and appreciate the beautiful work that went into a place as utilitarian as a post office. This post office along with so many others across the United States was constructed to provide jobs during the great depression as a part of FDR's New Deal in the 1930's. In addition to construction work the US Treasury Department's Section of Fine Arts contracted artists to create murals of a specific theme for each of these post offices. There are 35 murals in post offices throughout Wisconsin.

This oil on canvas mural is called "Decorative Interpretation of Unification of America Through the Post" painted by Ricard Brooks in 1937.

Find a link to more Wisconsin Postal Art here

Read more about the program here.

I am offering a special of free shipping worldwide on any item purchased now through Christmas from my Shady Grove Studios store