Making a Memory Quilt, Quilting Podcast #123

Today I have a sad podcast about my Mother-in-law, Ellen, who passed away on Thanksgiving day. I’m sharing stories about Ellen as I begin making a memory quilt from her clothes.

Listen to the podcast or download it to your computer using this player:

Working With Grief with a Memory Quilt

I don’t think grief is a straight road. It’s a twisty, windy path through the woods. Some days are great. Some days are very sad. Making this memory quilt for my Father-in-law, Chet, is helping me walk this path and process my sadness.

Here are the steps I’ve taken on this memory quilt:

1. Cutting up the shirts and ripping out dart seams to create flat pieces of fabric.

2. Stabilizing the fabrics with French Fuse so they are easier to piece and will reinforce the material in case there are small holes from wear. You can find French Fuse right here.

3. Pressing the French Fuse to the wrong side of each piece with a medium heat iron.

Grieving isn’t an easy process and we’re taking it one day at a time.

I hope to get back to making tutorials and podcasts on my usual schedule in January 2020. Be looking forward to my Word of the Year podcast the last week of December, or first week of January.

Find more Hello My Quilting Friends Podcast Episodes here.

I mentioned working on fabric designs in this podcast as well. You can find the smaller Praying Angel Quilt Panel here (1 yard design). You can find the larger Praying Angel Quilt Panel here (2 yard design).

Let’s go quilt,

Leah Day

Check out the most recent podcast episodes:

LeahDay

Leah Day has been teaching online since 2009. She's the creator of the Free Motion Quilting Project, a blog filled with thousands of quilting tutorial videos. Leah has written several books including 365 Free Motion Quilting Designs, Explore Walking Foot Quilting with Leah Day, and Mally the Maker and the Queen in the Quilt.

4 Responses

  1. Kathleen Scargle McCormick says:

    God bless you and yours. You have had a hard few months..take good care of you, Josh and James.

  2. Deb Ninis says:

    Leah & Josh, I am sorry for your loss… It is always hard to loose loved ones but more so around the holidays. It puts a dark cloud over the it. Praying your hearts heal. Blessing to you!

  3. Patricia Brown says:

    Im going to be making memory items from some of my mothers clothing as well for the siblings and grandchildren. I never thought to put dome stabilizer on the back of fabrics. But i guess thd lighter type fabrics would need sometjing to make rhem sturdier. Im glad i saw your
    posting.

  4. Helen Heyes says:

    It’s been a hard few months for you. I hope that you can find peace over the next few months. I am sure that your followers are all sending good thoughts your way.

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