Thursday Morning Wood

For several months after Gram was born, I couldn't even make dinner. Every night I was stumped: Jim would turn to me after the kids were finally in bed and ask what I wanted, and I had no idea. I just wanted something, and I wanted it now, but I didn't care what it was and I certainly wanted no role in preparing it. It took all the energy I had to make a pot of coffee in the morning, and I was only able to do that because my survival depended on it.

I guess that's what those first few months are about: survival. You eat and sleep and drink lots of coffee and you make sure your kids eat and sleep and poop. You keep them warm, and sometimes you manage to do the laundry.

Nine months later, and not only is my husband no longer the only one cooking dinner, I've actually started to feel a little creative again. For years I've wanted to make a quilt for Juniper, but I didn't know where to start. It can take me a half an hour to properly thread the needle on my sewing machine, and I can't cut a straight line in a piece of fabric to save my life. Last year when we went through all of Juniper's old clothes and sorted the unforgivably girly from the gender neutral, I knew I wanted to make a quilt from her old clothes. Or, if we're being honest, I had to make a quilt for me, because I wasn't comfortable stashing her babyhood into a box in the basement or handing it over to the Goodwill.

One of our friends is a bona-fide quilting artist (one of her quilts was just featured in a spread about our neighbors' unit in Dwell), and she was gracious and patient enough to sort through all of Juniper's old clothes and walk me through the process of turning them into a quilt. Talking with her gave me the courage to grab the scissors and start cutting. I reacquainted myself with my sewing machine, made a few trips to the fabric store for batting and backing and a quilting foot, and finally I finished this:


That square in the middle is from the shirt Juniper wore home from the hospital. If you look closely enough there are squares made from those ubiquitous swaddling blankets every baby gets at the hospital.

Jim told me that the other day when Gram woke up from his afternoon nap, Juniper heard him first and ran upstairs to grab her quilt. She dragged it into Gram's room along with a stool that she used to climb into his crib. Jim found them together snuggling under it, warm as toast.

Juniper's favorite evening activity is to sit under her blanket and quiz me about all of the squares. There's the one made from the bib her grandmother cross-stitched for her before she was born, the one from her first tiny t-shirt that I got as a gift at her baby shower, and the one featuring a cable car that her dad ironed on to a plain onesie.

So much better than a box in the basement.

[I haven't felt like posting lately --- between the kids and a full-time job and a new addiction to my sewing machine, there just isn't time. But if you'll indulge me, I'll contribute more here by occasionally showing some of the stuff I make. I know there are a billion craft blogs written by far more talented people than me, but in case there is anyone else out there who doesn't know how to use a pattern or sew a buttonhole, perhaps my stuff will persuade you to take the plunge and get started.]