Things Will Never Be the Same--Fall 2016 Bloggers Quilt Festival

It's time for that wonderful on-line Bloggers Quilt Festival once again! Amy does a great job putting this together and I'd like to thank her for her efforts! The quilt was one that I questioned very seriously whether it should be included. But then, I thought, if even one person gets inspired by this quilt to make their own story quilt, then it will all be totally worthwhile.

The story of a fire in our town

These kinds of story quilts are quite grueling actually. I don't think I realized the depth of emotion required to get to a finish, until last year when I finally took the last stitch and just sort of sagged back into my chair. My story is similar to lots of other people's across the USA {and Australia} in the last several years, only we didn't actually lose our house. Almost! But to some people that doesn't matter because 'almost' can't possibly be traumatic. lol  Yeah. Still laughing. But at least it was nature, not people causing the damage like in the case of the current rioting issues across the nation. I think that would be harder to process, don't you?

Trying to figure things out

There's always so much mental conflict, emotion and horror at dealing with these destructive acts of nature. Feeling completely out of control and wanting to place a little blame, figure out what went wrong and what we might do differently the next time. Feeling so fragile in the face the aftermath--what our family and friends are having to deal with. Trying to give real, true help and not just throw a little pity their way and then forget about their pain. Planning and working through the implementation of this quilt really helped me put all those feelings where they belonged and worked as a sort of therapy. Oh how I loved and hated this quilt!

Lots of crazy emotions

So much harder than I thought it would be, but I felt so driven to tell the story. Because it matters! And if you're a quilter, how else to tell the story but with fabric and thread? Stitch after stitch, I could feel the emotion being embedded into the fiber, almost beyond my control! Little details being added in constantly to add more emphasis--such as the little red and white dotty circles representing the embers flying through our town, setting one thing after another on fire. The flag that flew upside down in our town for months, signally our great distress to outsiders. The way I tried to write 'Pateros' to emulate our town sign that eerily burned {completely into two and then incinerated} and  now can never be replaced because of new zoning laws.

The pain of determining the value of our belongings

I posted a bit about the process on my blog here and there, but always felt so inadequate. Which then got a lot worse when I entered the quilt into our local quilt show {on the 1 yr. anniversary of our town burning} only to be basically shunned. {Yeah, it's true 'cuz this year I didn't even get my usual email to enter quilts!} My emotions were ALL OVER THE PLACE after that, but as my mom says, it got my 'mad up' and gave me the motivation to enter the quilt into a larger venue.

It really happened just like that

So terrifying, but at least it proved to me that I wasn't a complete and total whacko. Genuine shock and awe followed when I got the first glimpse of my quilt hanging in that much larger show. A Best of Show ribbon!! and whenever I made my way back over to look at my quilt, people standing in front of it for a very long time. This happened at the one other show I entered this quilt into as well. People standing, reading through the quilt, taking pictures, talking and crying with their friends as they took the time to process the message. So gratifying that the message was able to resonate with strangers. So humbling.

Things Will Never Be the Same

I don't care if this quilt gets voted on or not in this festival. It just seemed like a good place to enter it and say I'm so grateful to be a quilter in times like these. Whether or not I have another story quilt in me remains to be seen. This one still gets my nerves humming along just by reading through the words and remembering that day. That summer. And yes people in our community have moved on, recovered and/or rebuilt. Their lives have definitely improved, most of them. But not all. Some will always view that summer as the moment when their lives took a turn for the worse. That seems to be the capriciousness of life the world over.

Anyway, thanks for reading through if you did. My loyal readers have already heard the whole story over and over and over and over.*wink  I'm entering this quilt into the Applique category if you'd like to go have a look there as well!

Working Through the Emotion

Okay, here's the quilt that has been consuming all my time. It's the quilt about the fire that happened in our town approximately 10 months ago, all the fraught emotion for free. There's a lot of layers and subtleties to this quilt and honestly, I just don't have the time or heart to walk you through every detail right now. And after this is done, let me tell you, it's back to quilting just for fun around here!

The day it started for us....

Plus, I'm still wondering if I'll actually hit 'publish' on this post. It's just one of those quilts that seems kind of intensely crazy for people that weren't actually here. Ahh... so dramatic. It's not like the town was bombed or people died.

Some feelings and emotion...

No, but we lost things. Like our innocence that bad things never happen in our small town, USA. We lost our confidence that when it comes to structures and towns with a low profile, that state fire crews actually care. You think this would have been allowed to happen to a large tourist town? I think not.

So much love and support....

I get upset at the uselessness of it all. Yeah, yeah, nature was doing its thing at a whole new level. I do get that. Wow, do I get that. But there was definitely some communication problems and some mismanagement. We saw soooooo many firemen just standing and watching. Not local firefighters. They were killing themselves off trying to save everything. It was insane.

The whole event was just unreal and it will always stay with us in one way or another. I didn't actually lose my home, but I will never forget those 20-30 minutes of running through the house grabbing up the 'important items', trying to find my youngest son, driving forever to get somewhere safe, and then laying awake during the night thinking about what I wasn't able to take, and even more, worried about everything and everyone. Going back to the house the next day and seeing things fallen on the floor that I was sure were in the suburban and safe. Being on evacuation notice for days after where we were staying with friends. Wondering if a random spark would go ahead and catch fire on our house the next day like it did our cousins house. Should I be taking more out of the house and if so, where would be safe to store it? Worrying about my parents and all they were dealing with, what they were going to do.

Something I'll never forget....

My mom, dad, sister, mother-in-law, cousins, and so many people we knew didn't have the opportunity to go back into their houses because theirs was already in ashes and smoldering. Not just burnt a little, but practically incinerated. It was so unreal. What and how to take care of that, especially the uninsured? Driving through town and seeing friends and neighbors looking in shock and grief at the home they'd lived in all their life. All the tears. All the devastation and trauma. It felt like a bad movie, but instead, they've had to wake up to their new reality every day since. Second guess why they were worried about clearing the table instead of grabbing their pictures.

The whole quilt minus another little flame in the right corner...

So yes, 'Things will never be the same'. And they might be better someday. You never know. To some it is already better in a few ways. My mom and dad moved into their new home a couple weeks ago and it's nicer than anything they've ever lived in. Pretty fantastic actually, if you think losing 40 yrs. worth of stuff you've worked hard for is a good trade off. I'm thinking not as the stress has aged them tremendously and there are things that can never be replaced. We feel very blessed that nobody died. Extremely thankful as it could have happened so easily. There's just so many little stories winding their way through this quilt, but as you can see, I get all emotional just thinking about it. A little angry and maybe even a bit bitter. I need to work on that obviously.

We'll never forget the outpouring of love from people everywhere. The donations and the help. It was simply incredible and very touching. Our lives have been changed since this event and hopefully this quilt has helped me work through the worst of the feelings. It's all pin basted and ready to start stitching now although I'm shaking my head at what to do and where to start. It's been like that all along with this quilt. 'What do I do now?' The quilt show is the day after the first anniversary of the fire. That's my goal. Better get something figured out soon.*wink

Something Sweet and Something Not

I've been happily working on my Cactus Basket quilt, sewing the sashing onto the blocks this weekend. Things are going well and I am SO happy with the results. It's got a really great vibe going on that makes me practically hum. My mind, however, keeps wandering off on a different tangent, making it terribly hard to concentrate. You remember the 'I survived the fire' quilt idea?

Starting to put the Cactus Basket quilt together

Well, originally, I was going to use the Cactus Basket blocks and jump from there--throw some words, applique pictures etc. on the borders. But it's too sweet and spunky for that. I love it exactly as it is unfolding for me and I don't want to ruin it by forcing something on it that doesn't feel right. But darn it, I really like the idea of my fire quilt too! And the idea won't go away. It keeps coming back, and coming back again--nagging at me to do something about it. So, I fished out this partially completed improv. quilt top that I had played around with last fall. Would it work for the background? Do the colors work for what I need? Always better to have an interesting background for a story quilt you know.

Hmmm.... Four improv. log cabin blocks could definitely represent the cul de sac where we live (only four residences here). And only one house was even sort of touched by the fire (ours) so that little scrap of red is absolutely perfect. I found some texty fabric and quickly added our street address and also a funky bird I stumbled across. The scrapbooky look to the quilt is so already so very satisfying. Love that look. And before I knew it, I was off and running with ideas. Gotta make the most every drop of inspiration when it comes knocking or it tends to get lost in the busyness of life, right?

My new background for the 2014 Fire in Pateros quilt

So... Next thing I came up with was a mock-up of the city sign we (used to) see just as we're coming into our little town. I went back to a sort of haunting picture my daughter put up on the blog earlier this summer. {Well, if you're a hometown girl it would haunt you too.} It all feels sort of silly, but incredibly compelling at the same time. I wish I was better about jumping right in the middle of ideas like this all the time, then I might know what I'm actually doing here.....

It's starting to come together. I can feel it...

I haven't made a story quilt in a long time so this is really fun and energizing all at the same time, to try and get it just right. Simplicity is the key of course and a strong visual message. Of which I'm not usually very good at. Once again though, one of my kids bluntly criticized the 'accuracy' of my quilty picture. I have to keep reminding them that 'representational' is perfectly okay in quilting. When I remind them, they get it. It's just something they tend to forget. I always ask, 'What does it make you THINK of?'

Then another kid just went on and on about how different this quilt was and not my normal colors etc. With the kids I can just laugh it off, but adults do this too, which kind of burns in my gut. Why does everyone insist on trying to keep people in a box? Do you know how many times I've heard that 'Audrey makes fall colored quilts. That's her style.'  No, I'm still trying to find my style, but the sum total of it is NOT just using fall colored fabrics. Okay, you can relax--getting off of my soap box right now....

Hopefully the fire will be less blobby after I stitch it down....

So here I am. It's different. Brighter? Bolder. Complex in numerous ways that won't make sense to very many people. I'll probably have to keep explaining to the unquilty. But I'm well on my way to a 2014 Fire in Pateros quilt, project tote fixed up and everything. It seems like a wonderful thing to follow the ideas until they fizzle away, cuz you know they always do. For now I need to start the work of stitching down the letters and number onto the quilt so it will be ready for the next step. I've got lots of ideas for other parts in the quilt. Maybe if I scribble them down I'll be able to hang on to them till it's time to implement them.....