Side Step Top

 

The first quilt top I made for the quilters at Intermountain Medical Center was a scrappy snowball block affair in blues and creams. I’d started stitching the top on my British Janome days before we left England, and finished it on a borrowed machine at the Residence Inn. I packed the top, back and binding in my carry-on bag, so it wouldn’t be lost (as several things were) in our overseas shipment. Since then, I’ve designed, pieced and donated thirty-four queen-sized quilts for the hospital volunteers to hand-quilt. Today’s top – also in scrappy blues – would have been number thirty-five. I’d have been happy to make thirty-five more. But the quilters, once a formidable group, have dwindled until there’s only one left. We’ve search in vain for new quilters join her. She says when she started hand-quilting, it was a fun, social affair. Now, it’s neither fun nor social. So, she’s done. I guess that means I am, too.