Denine

Introduction

It was a strange day all around.   

   It was very windy but not too cold. 

     A Sunday.  
       Sunday April 1st, 1979.

The phone call came before breakfast.
    I was still in bed..

Denine was having trouble breathing.
    They would send her to the hospital.
      The ambulance siren wailed in the background 
         over the phone. 
           This was for real!                                                                                                                                                     

Before Church that morning, I asked the minister to pray for her. 

    And when he prayed, something inside me broke.   

      The feelings welled up.   

         This was serious!

I wanted to go to the hospital to see her.   

    We had forgotten to license our pickup.

        So I had to ask my mother-in-law to take me into Hamilton.   

           She was going anyway with a neighbour. 

              They were glad to help.   

                 Would an hour be long enough?

I spent just one hour at the Medical Centre.   

    What could I do anyway?

Denine was different this time.   

    She didn’t cry when she saw me.   

       She seemed glad to have me come.  

           She smiled and relaxed a bit as I cuddled her the best I could.   

               There were tubes everywhere and she was in an oxygen tent.  

                   I was unable to pick her up so I just rubbed her back

                      and smoothed her hair 

                         and told her how much I loved her.        

How many times in those 5 years had I gone to see her in a hospital?  

        St. Joseph’s.  

          The General. 

             McMaster.  

               Chedoke.  

                 Toronto Sick Children’s.

What were the reasons?   

          Tests.  

              Flu.     

                  Pneumonia.   

                      More tests.  

                          Emergency treatment for dehydration.  

                              Surgery on her legs.  

                                  Double pneumonia.   

                                      Plastic surgery.  

                                          X-rays.  

                                             High fevers.

How many high fevers had she run?  

     Did they ever find the cause?   

         I don’t believe they did. 

How many doctors had we seen?   

       Therapists. 

          Nurses.

             Lab technicians.

How many hours had we spent waiting?    

        Waiting to see doctors.   

          Waiting for the medication to start working.   

            Waiting for the fever to go down.   

              Waiting for the crying to stop.   

                Waiting for other people to drive when I could not.   

Then waiting with a two year old boy running around, 

     climbing all over me and everything else, 

        demanding a drink, 

           trips to the bathroom.

Then I was pregnant again and my back hurt so much.  

How I hated to wait.   

      Maybe hate is too nice a word for what I felt.   

Those inconsiderate people!!!   

     Didn’t they know I had an appointment for 11 a.m.   

        And now it’s 12:35!

Where was my husband in those days?   
        At home farming, 
               14 hours a day, 
                  7 days a week, 
                      365 days a year.

                         In those first eight years of our marriage 

                            we went on vacation once.

And yet God never left our side.   

     He was always there when I needed Him.  

         How many times did I cry out to Him in those days of sickness?   

               In those nights of fever.   

                    In those hours of waiting.  

He was always right there but I didn’t know 

    Until after I had stopped fighting.   

         Until after I had accepted.

God had chosen me — ME —.  

     He had chosen me.       

Out of all the mothers I know.   

     He had chosen me to be the mother of a very special child.   

         A profoundly handicapped child.  

 Denine.

 This is our story.

DJ Triangles, Raking Lawn and Rare Find

These are the triangles I have for the top row. Only 3 more to complete it.

1840's Farm House

In the meantime it has turned very warm outside and yard cleanup is the first thing. I have been raking the yard and cleaning off the flowerbeds around our 1840's farm house for 42 years now. Last Fall I dug up some not-yet-frozen spots to plant spring bulbs. Well, when I was raking in front of that lower window I found a coin. It is 1 3/8 inch wide.
It is made of copper and on one side it says   One Penny Token
1842. Wonder what I should do with it since we no longer use pennies in Canada.

 One Penny 1842

Denine

I have really been encouraged since posting my brief story about my first born daughter Denine who was born profoundly handicapped and died at the tender age of 5 some 35 years ago. One of the things I did to bring closure to my pain was to write her story and mine. This brought the most incredible healing and peace to my heart. At one time I thought I would publish this as a book, but got rejected by the publisher I submitted it to. It has taken me another 27 years to get up the courage to finally do it. The beauty of blogging is, I am the publisher and have freedom to publish my own work. 

Denine was born on a Thursday, so I will post a chapter on Thursday. My prayer is that God will bring healing to yet another heart as He has to mine.

Blessings,
Chris

Dear Jane Top Row

I completed the corner units for the top row and now my goal this week is to complete the rest of the top row triangles.

Top Row Progress

I have 5 completed and prepped 2 for applique last night after the girls left. The newest quilter in the group has competed her first top and we stretched it out ready for hand quilting. While she was practicing her stitches, I showed another how to do some embroidery stitches for her first quilt a Sunbonnet Sue made from a block she had that her great grandmother had  made many years ago. I will post pictures when it is completed. We photocopied the original block to get the pattern.  Now that completing Dear Jane is the main focus of my quilting time, I am happy with how quickly I am progressing, in spite of so many redos.

Its Good Friday and we are having lunch at our son's for my husband's birthday and Easter dinner there on Sunday. We get to spend several days this week with our little girl grand babies.
Here    is  link to the Easter version of Canadian Leonard Cohen's Hallelujah . This is the real reason we celebrate Easter. Jesus Christ crucified, buried and resurrected for the sins of all mankind. Hallelujah!

Blessings
Chris

Dear Jane Corners

My goal this week was to get the top 2 corner units done and I have. I found insights on doing the corners from the That Quilt blog where I got lots of help for many of the blocks. The first post I found was Jan 28, 2011 and it has taken me a while to re-find  the  triangle-wrangling  link, but I did. Every quilter who is making the Jane Stickle quilt needs to check this out.

Top Right corner

Top Left Corner

I marked the 1/4 inch intersection at the bottom point of the corner kite with a blue disappearing pen. Then I realized that it washes out with water but sets with hot iron. I was careful. I also stitched only to the intersection and back stitched to anchor it. this will be a 90 degree  seam when I add it to the body of the quilt. I want to make sure I can turn that corner neatly. 





I have come to the realization that I can only work on 1 thing at a time. I can work at several the same day but only have 1 in my hands or in the machine at a given moment. I have a list in a book of every quilt I ever started and the completion date of those that are completed. Every year I used to plan what quilts I was going to complete each month and closed the book then started something new. Although I am itching to get started at a couple of new big quilts, I have set the deadline of May guild meeting to complete the borders for Dear Jane.  The reasoning is simple. I plan to start a new DJ group in Sept and want to show the competed top to promote the class at the next guild meeting and I will not be able to attend guild until October. So there. Now to clear off both my 8' tables in order to help one of my girls stretch out her completed quilt top tomorrow. But before that, I have all the farm books piled on the tables and have to get the files up to date and out of the way.
Blessings,
Chris

Dear Jane

I wanted to spend quality time with you and instead I am spending quantity time with you. Sigh. I finally pulled out all the binders and fabrics to continue working on the triangles to finish you. Little did I know that paper piecing is an art that is easily forgotten when neglected for, say a year or so. Brenda Papadakis, your biographer, tells us that "what we do most we do best". Well, it appears that I make mistakes most.

Right side # 1

I started with RS1. It appears to be a very simple straight forward block. Nope. Paper piecing is done backwards and upside down. It is very systematic but NOT logical. I have to remember to not try to figure it out and think. I did most of the seams twice and some 3 times. I stitched the middle section wrong and had the chevrons pointing down instead of up.
That wide band at the base I did 4 times. First time I used the white. Second time I realized that there was a pattern that could be centered. Third time I centered it crooked. Fourth time I centered it straight and had enough to reach both ends at the same time. Good thing I still have a big box of scraps. Then I sewed on the white coping strips too narrow the first time. Then I trimmed them to what I thought was straight only to find that when I sewed the triangles on each side, they were crooked. Now, this is the first of 52 pieced triangles, 56 fabric triangles and 4 corner kites. I figured I should at least get this one right. So, after removing the fabric triangles the second time, I got it right.

I was sewing what I thought was an accurate 1/4 inch seam from the edge of the fabric triangle. But it ended up crooked. So, instead, I stitched along the edge of the paper pieced unit using the seam there as a guide. Not sure why, but it worked. I had tried to sew these up with my Brother that handles the bulk very well, except that somehow the bobbin case fell out and when I tried to get it, I pushed it into the underside of the machine case and had a time trying to get it out. The machine sits down inside a craft table. I finally turned the machine upside down and gave it a shake and it fell out.


For TR # 2 I thought I was all warmed up. Yes. Warmed up to continue making errors. The worst one was sewing on a white tree trunk. Then, I had not matched the ends carefully and the triangle on the left was off, so, back to the seam ripper that is never out of reach. Then, the same issue with the coping strips. So same solution. I had pinned several of these units then chain pieced them. Then pressed them. Then found the errors. I think they look pretty good now.

Top Row # 2

I am glad that I took the time now to redo these units now. Otherwise, I would complete all the triangles then chain piece all the units then press them all and then find them all out of line.

Blessings,
Chris