My Journey with Memory Quilts - What Started it All

I have a friend Taby Durr and she lost her sister,Taronna Sewalt, several years ago. She asked me if I would make a memory quilt for her. I had never done that before, but I said yes. Well, several months later she showed up at my house with two, yes, two 30 gallon trash bags full of clothes that had belonged to her sister.

She actually needed six memory quilts so the several family members would each have a quilt to memorialize Taronna's life.

The first quilt was for their mother, Maw. I used Taronna's clothes to make the quilt blocks. We printed pictures of her from throughout her life. We added pictures to every quilt.

The second quilt was for her sister's best friend, Jane. They had been friends since childhood. Taby and I are holding the quilt for the photo.

The third quilt was for her sister's husband, Jeff. This quilt even had a block made from a rabbit fur sweater. Jeff had given Taronna the rabbit fur sweater for a gift while they were dating. I had no idea how to use that, but God helped me work it out!

The third and fourth quilts were for her children. This is a picture of the son, Judd's quilt before the pictures were added. The quilt was designed with black empty spaces to accommodate the pictures.

You can see a few of the pictures added at the top of the quilt.

 

This is the daughter, JeTonna's finished quilt.

Taby and I are on the left and Jetonna is on the right.

 

 

The last quilt was for Taby. I cannot seem to find a picture of the completed quilt with the pictures, but here are the blocks that were made from her clothes.

 

This was a long process that sent me on a journey I never expected. Taby was the person who God used to send me on this journey. I had no idea how to make this kind of quilt. I prayed, A LOT. God guided me through the process one quilt at a time. It took two or three years to finally get all of the quilts completed.

 

I have tried to follow the path God sets before me. It is not always easy, but I have found that God always provides just what I need, just when I need it. For example, as I was writing this post, my husband came out with a pile of my junk to go through. Well, lo and behold, my journal notes about these quilts were in that pile of junk.  

 

So, even though I had no experience with making memory quilts, God provided me the knowledge and tenacity to get it done. All the praise and glory goes to God.