Wedding Needle to Fabric

The history of quilts as utilitarian items stretches back thousands of years. In fact, the word quilt is adapted from the French cuilte, which grows out of the Latin culcita (“a stuffed sack”).
Originally, when just getting through a day entailed dawn-to-dusk work, quilts were entirely functional, made for warmth in the bed or to cover doorways or windows that were inadequate against the cold. As the centuries progressed, and life got easier, quilts began to marry function and art. On one hand, they were a practical repository for scraps of worn-out clothing; beyond that, though, they provided a canvas for personal expression, most remarkably amongst women who had been denied the opportunity to learn to read and write. Handiwork is its own kind of literacy. The resulting folk art tells their stories visually; without command of letters, they used fabric to create representations of their experience.
Taken together, all these folk art quilts present a unique version of history that words could never capture. We can look at a quilt, its fabrics, its stitches, its details, and be transported into the life of a woman who lived hundreds of years ago, feeling an intimate connection with the maker. We can touch what she touched. We can learn about her from her quilting choices. We get a sense of the texture of her days.
The website Why Quilts Matter: History, Art & Politics sums up the lasting power of quilts:
…you won’t find an object more central to the history of women than the quilt. [We should consider] the quilt’s historical and current roles as (among others) an avenue of personal expression, a sly medium of social and political opinion, and a building block of financial security. Unique among objects, quilts are both lowly “women’s work” and great art. They are something made from nothing; they are both nurturing and inspiring. They can communicate both intimate memories and great societal truths, and they have throughout history.
For me, I am not only taken by the quilt as an historical artifact, as craft become art, as political statement, I am fascinated by its ability to tell a story. Thanks to the gifts and willingness of my mother and her sister, Byron and I have just such a quilt, a document of our wedding weekend, a piece of folk art that captures the support and community that surrounded us on the day we made a public commitment to each other.

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Byron and I married at an environmental learning center in Northern Minnesota; due to the generosity of its founder, we had the run of the campus for our wedding weekend, so most guests came Friday through Sunday so as to enjoy the rock climbing wall, ropes course, hiking, and canoeing. We also were able to ask them to take some time to create blocks for our wedding quilt. There was a room set aside for the project, and my mom and Aunt Geri not only brought material and implements, they also kindly dedicated six hours that Saturday, guiding guests in their creations.
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Byron’s mom and dad, with their home on the edge of Big Woods State Park, lived surrounded by trees. Also, his mom painted banners with these tree images on them; we stood in front of the banners during the ceremony.
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I have long called my beloved friend Virginia by the nickname “chicken butt.” No reason, really. I just like it. So she made us a chicken, pecking up hugs and kisses.
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My family name, in Finnish, means “Mountain Ash Tree.” These are the berries of the Mountain Ash, made by my mom.
After the wedding, my mom started work on the quilting. Her notes reveal that it took 25 hours to machine applique 46 of the 48 blocks. At one point, she asked for input from Byron and me for the placement or order of the blocks. We laid out all the blocks on friend Virginia’s living room floor and decided which piece should go where. A few months later, Mom pieced the top by machine, including borders, for 16 hours. She washed the batting by hand in a bath tub and let it air dry. The hand quilting took one-and-a-half years. Those with discerning eyes will note that each block has white-on-white quilting and a repeat of what is already in the block–like a bird or a tree. She sums up: “As usual–I enjoyed doing every step and every little stitch.”
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Here are pals Timmy (a devoted skiier), Mary Beth, and Siena. In the years since our marriage, they’ve added daughter Paloma to the line-up. In its way, this quilt block represents their family as it was at a very specific point in time.
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This block, which my brother made, also represents a specific moment in his family’s life: when they were about to wing off from New Mexico to Japan (his next post in the military).
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My cousin Kurt is an odonatologist (dragonfly expert). Here’s his book: http://www.amazon.com/Dragonflies-North-Woods-Kurt-Mead/dp/0979200652
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Byron’s aunt, great-aunt and great-uncle made this block before they were eaten by wolves.

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When Byron biked from Seattle to Minneapolis, as one does, he hooked up with a traveling group of biking kids and their leaders. One of the leaders, Julie, made this block.
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After finishing college, I nannied in the Twin Cities for a year. The family came to the wedding, and their son rocked the talent show with his mad yo-yo skillz. I used to change his diapers, and then he made a block for our quilt.

The blocks go on and on, each one telling a story or representing the connection between maker and bride or groom. Absolutely, this quilt is one of my most-treasured possessions, something I would be devastated to lose.

It’s more than a personal treasure, of course. It’s the story of a weekend, of a community, of the woman who stitched it, of the individuals who expressed themselves through cutting and arranging fabrics.

I hope one day my great-great-great-great grandchildren run their fingertips over the nearly invisible white-on-white stars, moons, dragonflies, suns, and berries

and feel each stitch as a legacy of love.

Comments

comments

Comments

14 responses to “Wedding Needle to Fabric”

  1. ilyanna Avatar

    just wow. treasure. oh. frabjous joy.

    thank you for sharing.

  2. chlost Avatar

    Wow–what an awesome gift from your guests as well as your mom! I love the back stories that go with the blocks. Hopefully, those stories will also be preserved for future generations. Do you hang the quilt? Use it on a bed? It is so precious, I can’t imagine what you would feel safe to do with it.

  3. jenny_o Avatar
    jenny_o

    Absolutely fascinating – what a beautiful thing to own.

    Eaten by wolves, eh? 🙂

    Would you consider telling us about the rest of the blocks? I finished reading with regret that you had stopped writing.

    1. Jocelyn Avatar

      Wow, how cool that you’d be interested to see and know more about the rest of the blocks! That makes me happy, especially since I almost deleted five or six of the pictures in this post, thinking they were too much.

      Yes, I’d love to do a follow-up post here soonish, detailing the whole quilt.

      1. jenny_o Avatar
        jenny_o

        Yes, please/thanks!

  4. Katherine Avatar
    Katherine

    Yes, please do show the rest of the blocks! I love this. Such a wonderful treasure!

  5. kmkat Avatar

    That quilt is priceless (as you must know). Yes, please, show us all the blocks and tell us their stories. Any other relatives or friends eaten by wolves or lost down an ice crevasse on an unnamed glacier?

  6. magpie Avatar

    that’s extraordinary. wow.

  7. jess Avatar
    jess

    That is amazing. Your mom is amazing! I too, want to see more.

  8. Maria Avatar

    It is so like you to have just sort of wedding. And now I feel foolish because I don’t really know you, I just enjoy pretending that I do. I wonder what my wedding says about me. We were married in a cemetery in Iowa and afterwards took everyone out for pie at this tiny little cafe that closed down for the day just to fit us all in. I can’t imagine any of my relatives or Bing’s going for your kind of wedding. They are all far too lazy. It would be like, “Good hell, I have to WORK on a CRAFT at this wedding? Where the fuck are those really good mints? I just want CAKE! And good lord….I have to HIKE somewhere???” I wouldn’t have done much hiking at your wedding, but I would have enjoyed making a quilt block. I do know how to quilt. You didn’t grow up on an Iowa farm NOT knowing how to quilt or drive a tractor.

  9. lime Avatar

    such a beautiful treasure

  10. Green Girl in Wisconsin Avatar
    Green Girl in Wisconsin

    Holy wow. What a magnificent life and testimony of it!

  11. actonbell Avatar
    actonbell

    There are no words for how amazing this is.

  12. Jenn @ Juggling Life Avatar

    I couldn’t love this more.

    Also? They were eaten by wolves–bwahahahaha!

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