Sapphire Stitches

I've been doing a lot of thinking about my friend Linda.  She passed in October of 2005 of metastatic breast cancer.   I don't know what brought on all the memories other than the fact that I have been digitizing a very unique design for breast cancer awareness and....yes there is more than one side to me.....piecing  a quilt in pinks for someone with breast cancer.  Linda loved the color pink and pastels.  She also loved scrappy quilts.  This quilt is also scrappy with many different pinks and yellows.  I am extremely pleased with the way this quilt is coming out and hope the recipient will also love it.

When Linda was diagnosed with breast cancer we all wanted to do a quilt for her but she said no.  She informed us that that was what she did.....make quilts....and she didn't feel that sick yet.  She endured chemo for 5 years.  Every Friday she went for treatment.  If she couldn't get treatment because counts were down she was extremely upset....She thought of chemo as what was keeping her alive.....her lifeline.

While getting her weekly chemo treatments she would minister to other ladies who were also in the same boat as she was.  She would talk to them about hopes, and dreams and would encourage them to live the best life that they could.  One day before chemo she and I sat in my hot tub and ate chocolate covered strawberries and laughed.  Our skin was still red by the time we got to the infusion center.  We laughed the whole time.

Here is a quilt wall hanging we did in honor of Linda.  She gave it to the infusion center where she received chemo.  I don't know if it still hangs there, but it did for the longest time.  Can you tell its a pink ribbon watercolor.   We all took turns working on it.  One person would put the squares in place and someone else would come along and rearrange them.  Someone picked out the borders..someone stitched it in place and someone quilted it.  It was truly a labor of love

These pictures of Linda were taken at the beginning of round two of breast cancer.  She had her hair.  The last 3 years of her life she had no hair and wore fuzzy hats.  If I can find the picture I'll post it here.