For those reading my current blog entries, many of you know that I recently went to Dallas for a geTOGether for my yahoo Tapestry of Grace support group. Many of you have also asked about details on the quilt.  For a brief synopsis, I have recapped.  But the bulk of the quilt and scrapbooks is further down if you wish to skip some of this.  =)

   We went to Dallas to actually meet face to face and also to surprise our recently "retired" list owner, Dody. For months I’ve secretly been in cahoots with other ladies on how to surprise and bless this woman who has handled a list of 1400+ funny, warm, loving homeschool moms! I wanted to make a quilt for Dody, and thought it would be more fun and meaningful, if I invited others to join in the fun! Thus, we made a friendship quilt for her with lots of meaning behind it.

     A couple of our moderators worked tirelessly to go through the 1400+ names of our yahoo group, to invite everyone but Dody. That was no easy task. When Dody announced her retirement to the list, the invites were sent. Sadly, some ladies never realized they got the invite, since it went into spam folders or got mixed up with a mass of other e-mail. Other ladies wanted to be more involved, but were dealing with illness. Nevertheless, God was in this. A group of ladies contributed fabrics which were truly a representation of what our entire yahoo list was all about. Every single lady of the 1400+ members was represented in this quilt, and that’s exactly what I was praying for!

     Our goal at TOG LooseThreads list is to keep things positive and glorifying to the Lord and supportive of TOG, because this is a TOG support group. Otherwise, we get very off topic. We have discussed TOG. We have discussed how to homeschool. We have discussed perseverance. We have prayed for each other. We have asked what the best vacuum cleaner is. Right now there is a thread discussing how to house train puppies! We have laughed. We have cried. That is what this quilt needed to represent.

     I asked each lady, who wished to participate, to snail mail 1/4 yard of their favorite quilt fabric. Anything they wanted that represented them! It was so much fun to receive these in the mail. The variety was beyond my expectations! There was kitty cat fabric! There was shamrock fabric because the dd does Irish dancing. There were dots (we have a major dots discussion on our list, about how we use dots to organize all of our books.) There were bluebonnets, not only from me =) but also from another lady in Texas! There was cowboy fabric! There was cooking fabric! There was penguin fabric from the lady who loves penguins and killer whale fabric from the lady who loves them! There was moose and salmon and Christmas fabric because Dody loves them! There was even a Santa holding a salmon! LOL There was Rocky Mountain fabric! There was flip flop fabric from the ladies who live in California! One lady found fabrics full of loose threads…the name of our yahoo group is TOG LooseThreads! There was fabric of the Christian fish symbol and a fabric of the Bible! There was US Navy fabric and Hawaii fabric! There was Washington DC fabric! There was Australian fabric! There was a fabric with chatty lips! I could go on and on!

     Corrine, my quilting partner, went shopping for fabrics with me. We found the perfect fabric to tie everything together! Dessert fabric to represent the Corner!

    You see, there is a lot of joking on our list and out of control discussions on dots and page protecting (and a few other topics), neither of which Dody does! So anytime we’d have a crazy discussion going on, Dody would say, "To the corner!" in jest. Well the ladies started bringing chocolate chip cookies, brownies, hot chocolate, etc to their virtual corners, enticing others to join them. It even got to the point that when the dot and PP discussions began, the ladies would put themselves into the corner, with the promise of delectable treats…would anyone care to join? It has been a hoot!

    Here are the piles of mail I recieved!  Sometimes the mail box would be so full, the mail man just hand delivered them to my door! I was getting so many packages, he was making daily deliveries to my front door!  LOL

     Then I organized all the fabrics with the ladies' names and any  preferences for any particular areas of the fabrics to fussy cut!

     Then sewing day came and I was nervous!  This wasn't just my quilt.  I was doing this to represent all of us for someone very special. 

     According to the pattern, I cut triangles out of freezer paper and laid strips of fabrics to sew to the paper.

It was fun to see the emerging results!

I tried to put lights next to darks, large prints next to small, etc. 

Then I'd trim the triangle.

   After sewing 12 triangles, I arranged them into a star pattern.  I tried not to stress over the best look.  The possibilities were endless!

     Then I had to design templates for the black background.  This was no easy task!  Actually, drawing the freezer paper template and using it as a pattern to cut out the black fabric was easy. Sewing it into the y seams into the star was no easy task! 

 Here are the templates and the black background sewn in...

Then I ripped out all the freezer paper...

I added black borders...

Then I added the dessert border...

     Time to start the back of the quilt.  I used strips of muslin and dessert fabric to make signature blocks for the contributors.

I rotary cut them into 4" blocks...

Made signatures...

I pondered the possibilities of arranging the sig blocks in random fashion...

Then I made the quilt sandwich...

I tied the sandwich together with a variety of colors of loose threads (DMC floss)...

Close up, for which many of you have asked for!  ;)

I printed out a quilt label which I blanket stitched to the lower left back corner...

Ta Da!  Front of quilt...

Back of quilt...Finis!

     I found this foundation paper pieced star pattern, which was manageable for a busy homeschool mom to sew and have completed before the March 1 weekend! =) I saw the star as representing God’s guidance to Dody in leading our group to honor Him. The star of various fabrics represented our diversity. The colored threads tying the quilt together, represented the loose threads name of our group. The border around the star was the cookie corner. Turn the quilt over, and the signature blocks of the fabric contributors were in a random pattern, as we milled in unity in the Cookie Corner! In the bottom left corner, I blanket stitched a computer print out quilt label giving the date and place of presentation and symbolism of the quilt.

     This was not the only handcrafted gift for Dody. There were also 2 scrapbooks. As the ladies donated fabrics, they also sent in muslin, some of which had huge signatures! Corrine came over in early February for a day of quilting!  She and I took those signatures and placed them on foundation paper, and then we took any fabrics the ladies contributed (because many ladies contributed more than one fabric, some sent as many as 5!) and we sewed them into pretty 8" blocks. We used the same technique as I had done the triangles.  We had soooooo much fun creating these.  The variations were endless! 

     These were mailed to Marsha, who cut out 8" windows from cardstock to place over each block. Then each lady shared why she chose the fabric she sent. Marsha printed these up and put them on the page with the block. Here's mine...

     That became the quilt block album. There was a states of the USA fabric that had been contributed. I loved it! Sadly, I couldn’t figure out how to use, nor could I squeeze anymore fabric into the star. So I sent that to Marsha, praying it would somehow have a prominent place in the scrapbooks. That fabric became the inside cover of the album! And sadly, I can't find a photo of that.  Marsha had found some cute sock fabric for the outside covers, bordered by dots! LOL (Socks was the theme of the weekend, and the name of our secret yahoo group, Operation Bless Dody’s Socks Off.)

     Then Marsha asked me to take 8x10’s of the quilt front and back. Marsha cropped those down and put them on card stock with a rod to look as though it was hanging on the wall. The quilt front 8x10 was the first page of the album, and the quilt back 8x10 was the last page of the album. And sadly, I can't find those photos either!

     Marsha compiled a second album of personal scrapbook pages made by many of us with pictures of our families and personal messages to Dody. In fact, one page had been sent by Marcia Somerville, author of Tapestry of Grace! Marsha compiled recipe book covers for cookbooks (designed by Melanie) over the years.

Tami printed lots of photos from our TLT files to cut up and make a Cookie Corner page.

She also made some pages of books on shelves with TOG DOTS on them! LOL

The first page of this book was the invitation that had been sent to all the ladies on the list in December.

     Here are the personal pages I made from our family.  This is my "thank you" page. I had never gotten around to signing the official card or saying much about my fabric choice because I was so busy!  LOL  I made these a few days before I left for Dallas!

     On the right hand side is a poem about moms that I think is reflective of Dody's goals for our group.  (It somehow got bumped to the bottom of this entry. )  

     Because she lives in Alaska, I thought she'd enjoy some high altitude photos of our family vacations in Colorado!

Because she loves to fish, I thought I'd share my son's first fish he caught in Colorado!

Then I had to throw a little Texas stuff in there!

And photos from our Year 1 TOG unit celebrations...

And from year 2!

A Mother’s Prayer

By Margaret Ellen Jacob Rice

Seated at the kitchen table,

Alone and late at night,

Her head is bowed in reverence,

Her hands are folded tight.

The prayers she whispers softly

Are filled with words of love,

Requesting for her children

God’s help from up above.

"Dear Jesus watch and keep them

And guide their steps each day,

Set angels all around each one,

And help them on their way.

"Dear Lord, I know it’s in Your will,

And I am much obliged

That You will shape and carefully tend

Each aspect of their lives."

God’s loving eyes gaze down at her;

He hears, He knows, He cares.

For she has touched the heart of God

With her tender mother’s prayer.