The Newest Quilt

Okay - So I have been to the wedding and shown the almost completed quilt to the Bride and Groom. Michelle Petro Gerster is Bob's niece and her husband Ben Gerster loved it! It wasn't completed when I showed it to them as I still had to finish the handwork on the binding, I thought that I would be able to do so over the weekend and leave it with them but ..... Well... I was having too much fun ;) Besides this gives me a chance to finish and clean the quilt (get the Marlin and Spike cat hair off) and find a way to express all the thoughts that I had about marriage while I was sewing it. What was cool is that I got to see thier reactions and explain the inspiration for the design. In thier home they have a large wooden wall hanging and Michelle has always been a conservative clean lines kind of girl so I made her a rail fence quilt that reflected the colors on thier walls and the clean fresh lines that she loves.

As I was sewing the rows together I noticed some flaws in the blocks, some didn't quite line up,
some had come unstitched towards the edges and some of the seams were wonky (both in the way the strips lay or which way I sewed the seam). Some were small flaws, some were critical in the construction of the quilt, there were areas that were quick and easy to fix and others that took some doing.

Wonky seams

As I surveyed these flaws I got to seeing that a marriage is very much like a quilt. In it's frabric it has it's good side and it's "not as attractive side" some fabrics more than others.  Some of the flaws were both minor in appearance and importance and could be left alone. I even found some that were large and would have taken a lot of work to fix, but quite frankly they just weren't worth fixing because ultimately they didn't matter to the strength and beauty of the quilt and maybe even showed that this was handmade and while not perfect was a labor of love. some of these flaws would actually disapear as the quilt grew and it would take a very discerning eye to spot, because it all sort of flowwed together and was still a thing of beauty.

wonky seams on the back side - I didn't always sew them the same direction

But there were some places where big or small the flaw was critical to the strength and look of the quilt. There were some spots were the seam had come unraveled and while I could have sewn the block to the next block there would have been a gap that over time would have allowed the quilt to slowy come apart.

So regardless of whether it was an easy fix where just an extra stitch or two would do, or if I had to rip out and rebuild some areas just to get to the flaww to repair it, I took the time to do it.

And bit by bit a beautiful quilt/marriage is born. The trick is to see the flaws for what they are, to know how they fit into your marriage, what needs to be removed, repaired or embraced. The ones with the most loved quilts/marriages are the ones that know how to have a discerning eye and a loving hand in the care of their precious quilt/marriage.

Have a Great Marriage  Michelle and Ben!