Prayer Quilt, Part Two

The quilt is finished. There will be a Blessing for the mother tonight where she will receive her gift from the school. She hopes to leave soon for Honduras in order to try some alternative treatments since the doctors here have nothing more to offer her. I hope that our intentions and prayers will help her in her journey.


The quilt was made with O-Wool Classic and knit on predominantly US 8s and 9s. The gauge for each square was wildly different, but adds to the dearness of the quilt.


The 1st graders (the mother's son's class), each knit a row or two in this square which is positioned so that it will rest over the mother's heart when she is wrapped in the quilt.


I do not know this woman personally, we only met once, but I was honored to be asked to work on this quilt. She is a tremendous woman and has touched so many lives in a positive way. I know that her spirit has touched mine. When I read a bit of this poem on Jen Lemen's blog, I thought of her ...

When Death Comes
by Mary Oliver

When death comes
like the hungry bear in autumn
when death comes and takes all the bright coins from his purse

to buy me, and snaps his purse shut;
when death comes
like the measle pox;

when death comes
like an iceberg between the shoulder blades,

I want to step through the door full of curiosity, wondering;
what is it going to be like, that cottage of darkness?

And therefore I look upon everything
as a brotherhood and a sisterhood,
and I look upon time as no more than an idea,
and I consider eternity as another possibility,

and I think of each life as a flower, as common
as a field daisy, and as singular,

and each name a comfortable music in the mouth
tending as all music does, toward silence,

and each body a lion of courage, and something
precious to the earth.

When it's over, I want to say: all my life
I was a bride married to amazement.
I was a bridegroom, taking the world into my arms.

When it's over, I don't want to wonder
if I have made of my life something particular, and real.
I don't want to find myself sighing and frightened
or full of argument.

I don't want to end up simply having visited this world.

Prayer Quilt, Part One

In two weeks, we have gone from an idea to an almost finished Prayer Quilt. I am just amazed at the RWS community! Within hours of putting yarn out in a basket in the front hall of the school, the Handwork Group received calls for more yarn -- we just couldn't keep enough balls (of the wonderful O-Wool Classic) in circulation. I thought that we could manage to get 33 squares and then last night as we sat around and counted up the squares, my jaw dropped ... 54 squares.


Students, parents, teachers, and the administrative staff all pitched in to make 6" x 6" garter stitch squares. The first graders each took turns knitting one precious square.


The sizes ranged from 5.5 inch squares to 6.5 inch squares. There is one stockinette square. Some squares have dropped stitches and yarn overs, twisted stitches and wild swings of tension. All were knit with love and reverence.

Last night we arranged and rearranged the squares trying to get the squares just right. Blocks of color or randomness? Geometrical patterns? Balanced color values? Thank goodness for the cookies, popcorn, and coffee!

Holly was our guide for the assembly and as I, the ever-uptight planner, was punching numbers into a calculator and pouring over graph paper with colored pencils, she intuitively massaged the squares into their proper places. She was brilliant!


I received my seaming assignment (V for vertical garter ridges, H for horizontal) and seamed them up this morning.


Melanie at The Yarn Lounge showed me how to execute a simple single crochet join for the assembly. It is just the right join to adjust for all the variations in sizes.


I hope to join with the other two sections tomorrow and hand the quilt off to a more accomplished crocheter for the border. I will post more pictures soon ...