When we began 2024, my theme for the year was “From my studio to yours.” This phrase implied I wanted to share with you tips and tricks I’ve learned throughout my quilting years. Some of these tips I shared before and had updated the process. Others were new.
However, I feel in many ways, I haven’t exactly lived up to the theme – at least not 100 percent of the time. In many ways 2024 was different from other years. Those of you who have consistently read my blogs know I’ve dealt with some difficult issues. My mom’s health. My daughter’s cervical cancer. My brother’s Multiple Myeloma diagnosis. Thankfully all three of those wonderful folks are doing well now. The doctors (finally) got to the bottom of where mom was bleeding and fixed it. Her hemoglobin and iron levels are really good nowadays. My daughter’s surgery was as perfect as it could be. Her margins were clear and now at the six-year mark, she remains cancer free. My brother had a successful stem cell transplant and is doing well.
All in all, I have so very much to be thankful for. However, December 2023 was not kind to us. Amid the Christmas trees and gift shopping, I had a cousin who was hospitalized. His name was Kemp. Kemp, like too many members of my family, had cancer. Follicular Lymphoma. He was diagnosed sometime in 2017 or 2018. This wasn’t a curable cancer, but it was treatable. However, he developed Covid Pneumonia in the fall of 2023. Whether his body was too weakened by the new cancer treatments he had just started, or the illness was just particularly severe, he passed away December 8 from complications of Covid Pneumonia.
I know it’s common for people to be remembered as “The life of a party,” or “He/She lit up a room as soon as they walked in it.” Since there was a bit of age difference between us, we never partied together, but I can say Kemp – he was the cousin you sought out at a family reunion. He was fun and he was positive. He didn’t let his cancer diagnosis get him down. He continued to work full time, take care of his three fur children (rescue dogs), and work on his house. He took care of his mother. And he was probably the closest thing to a brother that my brother had. When Eric and Kemp were young, they stayed at each other’s homes for part of the summer (Kemp lived in South Carolina and Eric here in North Carolina). The boys grew apart, but reconnected when Kemp moved to North Carolina for work. After this, they kept in close contact. When Kemp was diagnosed, Eric was one of his support systems. When I learned of Eric’s Multiple Myeloma diagnosis, Kemp was the first person I called, knowing he could tell me how best to support Eric.
The funeral was surreal. Eric gave the eulogy. Kemp’s father spoke and so did his sister.
So many people, so many good things were said.
We miss him so much.
My paternal aunt (Kemp’s mother) is my dad’s baby sister. And if I were honest, she is my favorite. Normally upbeat and quick to laugh and smile, burying her son almost killed her. I think it would have if she didn’t have the blessed assurance Kemp really is in a better place. It was difficult to watch her (even if it was from my cell phone back in North Carolina) sort through Kemp’s things. Finish the house repairs he was in the middle of when he died. Sell his household goods and truck…and then his house. Funny how life continues, and the world still spins even when we’re falling apart.
You feel helpless to help. There’s really nothing you can do or say to ease any of the hurt. Since I’m not local to them, I couldn’t help paint or clean. But what I could do, like most quilters, was make a quilt. Or three. Kemp was a Harley person. He owned and rode one. And at many of the Harley shops and events he went to, he’d buy a T-shirt. He had a closet full. So I asked my aunt, my cousin, and my uncle to pick out between 10 and 12 T-shirts each. Put them in separate bags and label each bag with their names. I promised quilts. While on a visit to check on our aunt, Eric picked up the T-shirts and delivered them to me in April 2024. And the work began.
I’ve made T-shirt quilts. Several, as a matter of fact. While they’re not my favorite type of quilt to make, I do enjoy the construction process. However, the quilting is a bit difficult. Layla the Long Arm doesn’t like the bulk. But it’s always fun to remember the story behind each shirt and I’m always glad that these memories are showcased in something everyone could see and could be kept at the owner’s fingertips.
But these T-shirt quilts were different. These aren’t so much T-shirt quilts as they are memory quilts. Remembrance quilts. I let those bags of shirts sit in my quilt studio a couple of weeks before I could even look at them. Finally I took a deep breath, opened the first bag I grabbed (which happened to be my uncle’s), and pulled out the shirts, only to immediately stuff them back in the bag. I couldn’t touch them. The feelings were too raw. Finally after giving myself a stern talking to (and maybe a glass of wine), I pulled the T-shirts back out and began to “debone” them.
“Deboning” a T-shirt simply means cutting up the sides of the shirt, removing the sleeves, and the crew neck collar. When you’re finished, you have the front and back of the shirt. I was lucky with Kemp’s. Some of his Harley shirts had workable graphics on the front and the back. Then you decide how much of the shirt to use and begin to rotary cut the area into workable blocks and stabilize them (it’s important to stabilize the T-shirts so the knit fabric plays nicely with the quilting cottons). After that, I design the quilt and begin construction. Not one of the three quilts I made looks exactly like the other two.
And all of this sounds very normal to a quilter. Nothing would set off alarm bells. Most T-shirt quilt construction is pretty easy – even for a beginner. But allow me to tell you something about making a T-shirt quilt for someone you loved who has passed: You see everything. I can tell you which shirts he wore the most. Those had tiny holes – some of which Kemp mended by hand with needle and thread. I can tell you which one he wore the least – the thermal one with long sleeves. It looked like it came right off the hanger in the store. Those T-shirts became something so much more than quilt blocks as I worked on these quilts. I knew where he traveled. I knew he liked short sleeved T-shirts more than long sleeved ones. He preferred larger graphic T’s.
Quilting, for the most part, is a solitary hobby. However, early on I quickly learned I worked better with these quilts on Tuesday nights. Tuesday nights are my Zoom and Sew nights with some quilters I’ve quilted with since around 2010. They keep me laughing and somewhere between the laughter and talk, I managed to debone 45 Harley shirts, stabilize them, and design three quilts without losing my mind. I’ve learned there are fabrics other than batiks which work really well with T-shirt quilts. When I discovered to never work on them without at least having a movie playing on my iPad, I garnered a list of movies I needed to watch during my lifetime. My sewing buddies supplied that, too. Too much silence meant thinking about the reason behind these quilts too much. Distraction – at least as much as I could muster – was my friend.
And now the construction part is complete. I put the last stitch in the last quilt today (as far as the tops go). I’m giving myself a mental vacation until after Christmas. Then I’ll load them, one at a time, on my long arm and do an edge-to-edge meander. I’ll bind them, make sure the labels are attached and either mail them or deliver them in person.
Since April, these quilts have been my life. Aside from the time spent at my Fall Quilt Retreat on other projects and the handwork I do when I watch TV, I’ve worked on Kemp’s T-shirt quilts almost every time I was in my studio. It’s kind of ironic in a way. When Kemp was first diagnosed with Follicular Lymphoma, I made him a quilt to take to the chemo treatments. Often these rooms are chilly, and it’s helpful to have something to cover up with. Being a quilter, I knew he had to have a quilt. To honor his time in the National Guard, I made the quilt from red, white, and blue fabrics and mailed it off.
I knew he would appreciate it, but had no idea how much. He called me and thanked me profusely for it. And every time I saw him, he mentioned how much he loved that quilt. We even discussed a quilt he wanted me to make for his bedroom. We had plans to go look at fabric the next time he was in North Carolina. I feel that instead of one quilt for his bedroom, I’ve now made three for him to honor his life.
As far as any quilting tips I could offer you from this experience, I can offer two. First, make sure your T-shirts are well stabilized. Second, make sure the quilting cottons used are firmly woven. As for other tips, be sure to love the folks around you while you’ve got them and don’t take for granted the life they led.
My aunt now has his red, white, and blue quilt. It’s my hope the three quilts which will be winding their way to South Carolina in a few months will bring comfort, preserve memories, and warm them like a hug from Kemp.
Until Next Week, From My Studio to Yours,
Love and Stitches,
Sherri and Felix
PS I will share pictures of the quilts as soon as they’re complete and in the hands of my aunt, uncle, and cousin.
