Reaching Out
Jane’s Reach Quilt
When I was diagnosed with
lymphoma in July, I knew that I was going to need help dealing with the
treatments and just surviving this ordeal. It was amazing to feel the
outpouring of support from friends and family. Although I still have two more
chemo treatments, I have been declared in complete remission.
I haven’t been shy about
reaching out for help during this time. Therefore my challenge quilt is about
reaching out. If you will allow them, people are more than happy to help you
through a rough patch.
I started with white silk
charmeuse. I drew around my hands on the paper side of freezer paper to create
a pattern. When I ironed the silk to the plastic side of the freezer paper, I
stabilized the silk and was able to see the pattern through the fabric.
Using my Inktense Blocks, I
colored the hands. Then I colored in the background with very thin and pale
textile paint. Next I wrote Reach over and over separated by stars on the
fingers. This actually turned out to be rather futile work because you really
can’t see the words easily.
At this point, I started
quilting. Using a different pattern for each hand and a color that I felt was
compatible, I quilted rather densely. For the background I chose a rainbow
colored thread and used relatively straight line quilting.
My next move was to add more
paint with the Inktense Blocks. I used wet on wet to get the colors to blend as
I added colors to my hands. The added bonus to this was the quilting patterns
really show up now. I think some of the paint settled in the thread which I
like. I ironed Timtex on the back side to keep it flat.
It was fun creating this little quilt. I was able to work on it in bits and pieces as I felt well enough to be up in the studio. Since I had to let it rest while the paint dried in different areas, I was able to let myself rest. But I still had the satisfaction of making something which gave me a boost. Please continue to pray for me as I go through two more chemo treatments.
