Stevens

 Stevens died in hospice yesterday morning.

I'd been anticipating The Call.  At 4 a.m. there was a gurgling sound that seemed to come from his bathroom.  I snoozed a while longer, got up, and made coffee.  I was reading the newspaper when my phone rang at 6:45.  That was the hospice nurse with the news.  I went to the hospital right away and sat in the room with him.  The nurse came in to do paperwork and said she'd write the time of death as 6:40.  I asked if it might have been earlier and she said yes, they discovered the death on their rounds.   I think the 4 a.m. gurgle was a last sign.   

Saturday morning I took a walk at the state park.  

There was no one to guard the parking lot while I was on the trail.  

Saturday afternoon our friends Debbie and Bill brought their therapy dogs Buddy, Shadow, and Shiloh to the hospital.  Their fellow therapy dogs (and owners) Beau and Mollie came, too.  

Stevens was not conscious for the visit but I certainly appreciated it.  

I took this photo last Monday (a week ago!) at the nursing home when he was somewhat alert.  "What does your shirt say?" I asked.  "Bowdoin College."  "Where is that?"  "Brunswick, Maine."

Those were the next-to-last words he spoke. In hospice I said "I love you" right into his ear. He opened his eye a bit and sort of rasped "I love you," then went back to sleep.

I am okay.  You probably have experienced the flurry of activity that occurs with a death of a loved one.    I  will write more later.   

Friday check in: a brief trip and in extremis

 On Tuesday I drove 430 miles to Paducah, Kentucky, for my first-ever AQS show.  My librarian friend Terri lives in Paducah and invited me to stay at her house in town.  

En route I got a call from the nursing home telling me that Stevens had very low blood pressure so they were sending him to the hospital.   

Anna, my Magpie friend, and I signed up for the AQS Awards Ceremony to start the show. We had gotten our food and were chatting with people at our table. My phone rang. I went out to the lobby to talk to the ER doctor who said S had a pulmonary embolism (blood clot in the lung) with two courses of treatment: surgery or blood thinners. I opted for surgery subject to the ER consultation with lung specialists.  

Awards over (wow, seeing so many Well-Known Quilters in one room!)  Anna and I went to the convention center for the Sneak Peek (=early opening).  On the show floor, as I was viewing a quilt called Colorful Chaos, the ER doctor called.  Due to co-morbidity (=dementia) surgery was not advised plus they found

Colorful Chaos

metastasizing tumors in S's pelvis.  They would move S from the ER to a regular hospital room.  I asked the ER doctor to have S's primary care physician call me.   That doctor happened to be on call that evening and he called me (still on the show floor).  He was so reassuring and said that S would be admitted for in-hospital hospice.

I actually slept well at Terri's.  I left at 6 a.m. and drove the 430 miles back home.  The weather was beautiful and once I reached Chicago the traffic was mercifully light.  

At home I had time to unload the car before going to the hospital.  Stevens is in a hospice suite.  He is unresponsive.  Any movement is only reflexive, not voluntary.  No food or water.  (His digestive system no longer works. He would choke on food and might aspirate water into his lungs.)  (A person in this state can live as long as ten days without water, I learned.)    I could stay overnight in the suite but I'm not -- better to be home where I can rest comfortably.   Yesterday afternoon (I was there) our pastor gave him communion.  (Dipping a sponge into the grape juice and passing the wafer over his tongue.) 

I picked up his clothes from the nursing home. As I was hanging the shirts in his closet and putting the socks in his dresser it hit me that he will never wear any of them again.  And I cried.

I am okay.  Sad, but okay.  I will write more later. 

Weekly update: Easter and a finish!

 

I hope your Easter weekend was pleasant.   In fourth grade we had a unit about weather lore. The one saying I remember is "if it rains on Easter Sunday it will rain every Sunday for the next seven weeks."  It rained yesterday. Maybe this year I will remember to keep track.  (Now I know that "seven weeks" means until Pentecost.) 

I went to church Thursday, Friday, and Sunday.  I had lunch with Stevens each day.  They put the wheelchair in the hall across from the nurses' station so he can interact with everyone who goes by.  He's been cleaning his plate.  This morning he'll be transported to the hospital for the post-op appointment with the surgeon. I'll meet him there. 

He wouldn't both smile and open his eyes for the photo, but there are bunny ears! 

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On Friday I showed a new project.  Now it's finished!  

There are different ways to create a zig-zag setting. This design was in Quick Method Quilts Galore, published by Leisure Arts in 1995. The book I had was falling apart so I tore the pattern out quite some time ago.

The quilt in the book was patterned from an antique, 83" x 92".  I didn't want to make such a large quilt and I didn't want to make 380 HSTs at the odd size of 3-1/4" finished. 

I used 2.5" (2" finished) HSTs from the box that I have on hand.  I added the top and bottom rows to make it longer.  I had to trim the sides considerably to even them up.    

The layout. 

I used a zipper insert (that's a metaphorical zipper, not a real one) on the back.  

Linking up with Oh Scrap!  Sew and Tell Design Wall Monday Monday Musings

 

Friday check in: a finish and a start + reading

Stevens has been sitting in a wheelchair just across from the nurse's station so he can see and react to people going by.  He can hold a spoon or fork to feed himself and he can grasp a cup to drink.  

I made this wheelchair-sized flimsy last fall.  It decided it was time to get quilted, so I did. (Walking foot and serpentine stitch.)

The setting triangles and border are from the 1990's Pablo's Puzzles line by Hoffman.  The tropical backing is a true 45" (no piecing required).  Both are from Barb M's estate sale.  It keeps on giving. 

I opened a drawer and found a long-ago start (just barely begun).  I have a box of 2.5" HSTs at the ready and after an evening all the units are done.  That is, unless I decide to make it larger.  


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Marie Benedict's latest novel featuring real women from history was a welcome diversion. 

In April, 1931, the doyennes of the Golden Age of British mysteries come together to solve an unsolvable murder.  Dorothy L. Sayers narrates; Agatha Christie, Ngaio Marsh, Margery Allingham, and Baroness Orczy also star.

Linking up with Finished or Not Friday  

Midweek: hiking boots and placemats

 When I visited Stevens at lunchtime yesterday he was dressed in sweatpants and a t-shirt and seated in a wheelchair across from the nurses' station!  That's progress. I meet with the entire care team today.

At the Zion Woman's Club board meeting yesterday afternoon the treasurer reported that last Friday's Bunco night netted $1400. Hooray!    Our charities account is fully funded to meet our obligations this year.  We allocated $1800 of that to nine local agencies (two food pantries, the library, the historical society, and others).  We previously allocated funds to GFWC-IL state projects.  We will present two scholarships ($1000 general and $500 art) to two girls graduating from Zion-Benton Twp High School this spring.

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There is a "wall of chapters" display each year at the P.E.O. Illinois convention. Chapters summarize their annual activities in a way that reflects the state president's theme.  This year the theme is "Blaze a Trail with P.E.O." and the wall of chapters will feature hiking boots.  I used the template provided as the base for a fabric collage. I fused the fabric and stitched the rickrack to card stock.  The lettering is printed on adhesive clear label stuff.    I fused a map to the back to cover the stitching.   

What's remarkable is that I remembered yesterday morning that I volunteered to make this. It's due May 1.  

Two placemats finished and two more ready to quilt.  The leftover blocks from Gray Scale didn't even make it to the orphans box. 

Linking up with  Wednesday Wait Loss 

Thanks for the shout out, Jennifer!

Weekly update: bunco, a surprise finish, and reading

 S is getting more alert.  His appetite is good.  I will learn more when I meet with the care team this week.

The Zion Woman's Club spring bunco party was Friday evening.   Everyone had a good time!  

My friend Donna won the quilt I donated to the raffle.

I'm sure the club treasurer will have a glowing report at tomorrow's board meeting. 

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Here's the ninth block for the guild BOM.  

These are 8" (finished) blocks so the pieces were a bit fiddly to cut.

From "just a few more blocks" (Friday's post) to a finished quilt -- here is Gray Scale!

68 x 80.

 The back is a black-on-white floral bed sheet (thrift shop bargain).  

I used the walking foot and serpentine stitch.  

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What a gem!   A historical novel, a bit of a mystery, emotional turmoil, and an unexpected and hopeful ending.

I learned about this book from Martha Barnett, host of "A Way With Words."  She was especially interested in the old Norse language that is a large part of the story.

I was taken with the setting.  The Clearances were decades when absentee landlords summarily evicted tenant farmers from land they had worked for generations.  By the 1840's the last territories to be 'cleared' were the outermost islands.    John Ferguson, a pastor without a pulpit and desperate to earn some money, accepts a job to go to a remote island, halfway to Norway, to evict its last resident, a farmer named Ivar. What he doesn't know is that Ivar doesn't speak Scots or English. His language is a Norse dialect.   John suffers an injury and Ivar nurses him back to health.  How can John deliver the eviction summons?   That inevitable action hovers over the story even as John creates a glossary of Ivar's language.   

As I was quilting I listened to the audio version of Osman's latest book.  

I really enjoy caper novels and this was such fun!   I look forward to the next entry in the series. (But I hope he'll keep up with the Thursday Murder Club....and is that the same Russian strongman in both?)

Linking up with Oh Scrap! Design Wall Monday Sew and Tell 

 

P.S.  At Bunco:  Lauren, who's 16, showed me the quilt she made for her uncle out of his shirts. She pieced, quilted, and bound it herself.   Her grandma Regina helped hold it. 

I especially liked the pieced back.  

Friday check in: placement and miscounting

 

Stevens moved to a rehab facility yesterday afternoon. I went to visit.  "Hello, my love," he greeted me before nodding off again.  

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I miscounted the number of blocks I made for Gray Scale. (See the lower right corner.)  Fortunately it's easy to remedy.

Linking up with Finished or Not Friday  

Midweek: donuts and a finish

I hope that today will bring a resolution to Stevens' placement.  Thanks once again for your kind words, prayers, and support.  

Yesterday was National Library Workers' Day -- "libraries work because you do."  The Zion Woman's Club delivered donuts to the staff at Zion-Benton Public Library.  ZWC was instrumental in establishing the Zion Memorial Library in 1937.  Steffi (next to me) was the bookmobile librarian, then head of youth services.  She was a trustee on the board that hired me.   She and I are the officers of the on-hiatus Friends of the Library.  

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Here's a fast finish!     I found a great print to border the latest Ohio Stars quilt.   It's a 1990's Hoffman from their Pablo's Puzzles line (from Barb M's estate sale). The back is an 80's Cranston print, also from that estate sale.  

I realize that I have finished the three parts of my April OMG, and it's only April 9.  

I put the Gray Scale blocks on the design wall. I think I'll add a column.  With an on-point setting that means 18 more blocks.  I have a few in the works.

 

Linking up with Wednesday Wait Loss

Weekly update: adjusting, and progress on goals + reading

 Stevens had laprascopic surgery on Friday afternoon. The results were good.  "I went from one end of the bowel to the other," said the surgeon when he called me, "and there's nothing there."  It's taken S all weekend to recover. He was half-awake when I visited Saturday morning and asleep this afternoon.  Thanks again to all of you for your concern and support.

The thirteen Lake County Round Table P.E.O. chapters held the annual Founder's Day luncheon on Saturday.  I'm round table president so I was the emcee.  This was the second year the event was at the Glen Flora Country Club in Waukegan.  The program featured two members of Chapter MQ-Lake Forest who received P.E.O. grants.  The chapter provided support and friendship to both women and invited them to membership.    

Ajar Chekirova is a native of Kazakhstan who used a an International Peace Scholarship for her graduate work at Ohio University. She now teaches political science at Lake Forest College. 

 Allie Boman received a Program for Continuing Education grant to get a certificate in professional editing. She is now CEO of Boman Communications which provides editing services for agencies and corporations. 

It's inspiring to hear these women's stories and gratifying to know that our fundraising efforts have contributed to their success.  

Chapter HS made the centerpieces. Aren't they clever?  

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In the studio:   

Garden Path blocks are assembled.  (The pattern is called Sky Diamonds. It is the Running Doe top-along for April.)

I made two placemats out of the cut-away triangles.

I signed up for the doll quilt swap at Humble Quilts. Here's the finished project.  I'll get it in the mail this week. 

I mistakenly thought that teal was the Rainbow Scrap Challenge color for April and made eight 9-patch blocks.  It turns out that this month's color is red.  It was no problem to make the eight 9ps in red.

Ohio Stars in the monthly color are my other 2025 RSC project. I combined teal (not-the-color) and red (the color).  Both backgrounds are pindots. What looks like white is a very, very light gray. 

I listened to the latest installment in the long-running Inspector Gamache series.  There's a new narrator who is French Canadian.  

Such great storytelling!  

Linking up with Oh Scrap! Sew and Tell  Design Wall Monday

P.S.  One of the raffle prizes at today's Razzle Dazzle (baton corps) mostaccioli dinner this afternoon.  (I took mine as carryout.)  I did not win.  

Friday check in: rafflemania

 Stevens is still in the hospital. The NG tube has been removed and he'll try real  food today.  He'll stay through the weekend (if not longer).   I toured three care facilities yesterday and found one that I really like.  

Our guild's annual Raffle Mania was Wednesday evening.  Members bring no-longer-loved quilt, textile, and fiber-related stuff (like yarn).  Each person gets free raffle tickets based on meeting attendance through the year.  Additional tickets are available for purchase.  I got six free and spend $20 for 35 more.  

I brought five 5-lb bags (100 yards total), a bag of spools of thread (decorative rayon, mostly), and some notions. 

Left: the bags I brought. The paper bags are where we put our raffle tickets. 

There was a lot on offer.  The guild made $467 from ticket sales. 

I came home with less than I brought -- but not by much!   By weight, 92 yards.  I spent $20 so that's 21 cents a yard.  

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Last evening I finished the blocks for the April top-along.  The pattern is called Sky Diamonds but I'm thinking Garden Path for the theme I've chosen.  

Linking up with Finished or Not Friday

Midweek: out like a lion, stash report, OMG + reading

 March ended like a lion. On Monday Stevens woke up vomiting. Paramedics took him to the ER where, after many tests, they found a bowel obstruction.  No surgery required but he is still in the hospital. I visited yesterday. He perked up when he saw me.  Not sure when he will be discharged and to where.  More discussion with hospital social worker and a care consultant today.  (The hospital is in the same complex as the clinic where his doctor's office is, so his own physician has been to see him.)  Meanwhile V was so helpful. While I was sitting with S in the ER she cleaned up thoroughly.  And I had a lovely surprise phone call last evening from Jean, S's first wife (she's in assisted living in New Hampshire).  

I've been so alert to S for so long that it's odd to be in the house by myself.  

I didn't have to rush back from Tuesday's Zion Woman's Club meeting.  We planted pinwheels to recognize Child Abuse Prevention Month.  

On to quilting!  

I used orphan blocks to make five more placemats. 

Stash report:   March fabric in:   ZERO!     March fabric out:  86 yards

YTD fabric in:  164-3/4, $58.00.  YTD fabric out:  274 yards.  Yay!

April goals:  (1) make Sky Diamonds, the Running Doe topalong this month.  I'm going to use realistic florals and green.

(2) Finish the doll quilt for the Humble Quilts swap. (It's a flimsy.  I have to choose the backing and figure out how to quilt it.) 

(3) Make a batch of teal/turquoise blocks (RSC color) for a wheelchair-sized quilt.

# # # # # #   Recent reading: 

The Page Turner 2025 FB group has "a book on someone else's shelf" as a prompt.  I did not travel far for my selection.    This is one of my husband's favorite books.  It's been in his bookcase ever since I met him . . . and only now have I read it in its entirety.  Poet and memoirist Donald Hall writes evocatively and lovingly about the summers he spent on his grandparents' farm in New Hampshire.  Each chapter can stand alone; collectively they show the progression as Hall grows up and his grandparents grow older.  The 1979 edition includes a coda that tells what happened next -- Hall and his wife Jane Kenyon moved to the farm in 1975 after his grandmother passed away (at 96) and lived there the rest of their lives.  (Kenyon died in 1995 and Hall died in 2018.)   

[The farmhouse is now a historic property with a nonprofit board restoring and maintaining it.]

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  An intriguing story based on the life of the champion thoroughbred Lexington.  I enjoyed the multiple points of view -- Lexington's trainer in the 1850's, an art dealer in the 1950's, and the contemporary art historian and the Smithsonian scientist.   I listened to the audio version. The multi-voiced narration was easy to follow. 

Diann (Little Penguin Quilts) recommended this a while back.  Thanks, Diann!

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I've been an Anne Tyler fan for decades.  Her characters are spot-on -- people we know all too well, situations we are all too familiar with.  

Just before her daughter's wedding Gail Baines finds out that she has lost her long-time job as assistant to the headmistress of a private school.  She barely has time to adjust to that shock when  her ex-husband Max shows up at her door.  He explains that he can't stay at their daughter's house because he is fostering a cat and the fiance is allergic to cats.  What can Gail do but ask him in?  Both of them have always been socially awkward whereas the fiance's family is very polished and more affluent.    Gail and Max negotiate the social terrain, their daughter's pre-wedding nerves (or, remarkable lack of them), and in so doing Gail remembers how they met and why they split up.  And in the end . . . she has a cat and, maybe, a renewed relationship.

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Weekly update: an exhibit, OMG, RSC, reading

 Thank you all for your supportive comments regarding my husband.  The care home assessment was Friday.  His condition is beyond what this particular facility is rated to accommodate.  For now we are increasing in-home care (two caregivers have been recruited to help with the 6 p.m.-bedtime shift (V comes in the morning)).  We have a video visit with his doctor on Tuesday.  

I was able to take time Saturday morning to see this exhibit at the Dunn Museum (part of the forest preserve district).

The oldest quilt was made in Pennsylvania in 1850 (large picture on left).  It came to Lake County after WWII when the maker's great-grandson moved to Waukegan.  

These are county fair ribbons from 1899 to 1904.

The dress on the left was a wedding dress from 1883.  The turquoise dress on the upper right is Thai silk, donated by a friend of mine who served in the Peace Corps in Thailand from 2000-2002.

I had time for a short forest preserve walk before going home.  It was nice to stretch my legs.

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I completed two of my OMG projects and most of the third.   Upper right:  SAHRR flimsy complete.  Lower right:  Transport top-along flimsy complete.  Left:  Mosaic Sparkler blocks are assembled but need borders.

The RSC yellow Ohio Stars are quilted and bound. 

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"A trilogy" is one of the prompts for The Page Turner 2025 FB group.   I chose Conrad Richter's Awakening Land.

I have known about these books for decades but only now have I read them. (I'd have loved them when I was in high school.) As I read I thought about my ancestors who were contemporaneous with Richter's characters. I appreciate more what their lives were like.

The Trees begins in the late 1780's when the U.S. government encouraged settlement in the Northwest Territory (Ohio to Wisconsin). Worth Luckett takes his family from Pennsylvania to the dense woods of eastern Ohio. Oldest daughter Sayward, who is the fulcrum of all three novels, raises her siblings after their mother's death, manages the household, and creates the farm. She marries another settler, lawyer Portius Wheeler.

The Fields takes place in the 19th century (Portius attends the Ohio statehood ceremony in 1803). He becomes a judge; she manages the Luckett land; they have many children. The settlement becomes thriving town called Americus.

The Town spans the 1830's to the Civil War. The Wheelers are the prominent family in town. One son becomes governor; another graduates from Annapolis; the youngest becomes a firebrand abolitionist journalist. One daughter marries the town doctor; another daughter marries an English lord; another becomes an academic.

As Richter writes in the acknowledgement, he wanted to tell the story of "those whose names never figured in the history book but whose influence on their own times and country was incalculable." He continues, "If this novel has had any other pruose than to tell some of their story, it has been to try to impart to the reader the felling of having lived for a while in those earlier days....and the broader stuff of reality that was the lot of the great majority of men and whomen who...lived through comparable events and emotions, for life is endlessly resourceful and inexhaustible. It is only the author who is limited and mortal."

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