I didn’t. I haven’t even misplaced them.
Like some people I can read upside down and backwards. I can write, and quilt, words backwards. This might be one of those skills that allows me to be a fairly decent quilter. (And before you say anything I’m not seeking compliments on my quilting skills, promise.) I like to get into the zone, the creative space, and see exactly when happens when. And that statement completely changes what I’m doing for a quilt challenge, this will happen once I get back from St. Louis.
A few years ago I made a quilt for a friend who led faith based journaling retreats. Oh how those moments still live in my heart. I brought her some of my stash to choose fabrics, purchased muslin for the background, fabric markers to draw on the center panel. The original drawing is of a journal, pages open, on one side the words “Journaling, a Journey of the Heart” encouraged the retreatants. When the drawing on muslin was complete there was a slight change in phrasing, “Journaling, a Journey to the Heart.” That wee little preposition makes a huge difference in the meaning. While both hold deep meaning, “to the heart” holds with in it the meaning of why I quilt.
A journey to the heart peels away the layers, allowing a vulnerability, an openness, a willingness to explore the joys, the hurts, the love, the like, the anguish, the grief, the compassion of the being who is (insert name here). This quilter’s journey holds so much memory. I can see quilts that need to be finished. I can see quilts that long to be made. I can see the change in a quilt that said one thing when I got started, and told me something else. I can see a quilt that wants to be revisited, leaving me a little rattled as I don’t repeat quilts. Seeing quilts in , and experiencing the longing to
To the Heart, the middle, the center, the core, the coeur.
As I write and quilt at this moment, this is the place that I’m journeying, to the heart.
While the thought that I’d lost the words and the quilting place lived deep inside my head, and my heart the peeling back of the layers makes more sense. Journeying to the heart of who I am as a quilt maker, writer, and person. It’s like my hands, and feet, and lungs, and guts, and womanly parts, and soul, and mind, and…oh you get the point.
If one dream should fall and break into a thousand pieces, never be afraid to pick up one of those pieces and begin again. – Flavia
So I’m looking at the dream. Looking at the heart. Looking at me. Journeying. Quilting. Thinking. Praying. Being.
God bless,
Teri
A Quilter's Heart 