Brilliance in Patches

A question had been quietly lingering in the back of my mind since our first family camping trip to Unicoi State Park back in March. The question became considerably louder and more urgent when we returned from our Tour of America a couple of weeks ago. “What to do with the patches?”

When we took our first camping trip with KitMama and family, Papa Bear observed that they have a backpack onto which they sew patches collected from places they have camped. “Ah,” says Papa Bear, “something else I can collect!” No, make that, “Ah, we should collect patches, too, as a way of remembering all of the great places we camped at!” “Okay,” I say. All the while thinking, what am I supposed to sew those patches onto so we can keep them for all eternity?

A backpack? No, we haven’t had one last us more than a few years. Our tent? No, we don’t use it, really. Popper? No, eventually we’ll be trading it in for a larger model. One of Papa Bear’s field jackets from his AF days? No, that’s not quite right, either.

So, I stuck our first patches in my sewing drawer, and put the question on the back burner.

Till we got home. And I opened up my travel bag and found about two dozen patches. Hmmmm. What am I going to do with all these patches? It took me a couple of days of simmering, and then it came to me in the wee hours of the morning.

A quilt! And, not just any quilt, but a denim quilt made from cut-off jeans. Brilliant! No other fabric says “camping” like denim, especially broken-in denim. And, we can take it with us when we camp or travel.

Of course, it’s going to take several years to finish, but I got a good start by attacking some of BooBoo’s too-short jeans, as well as one of my maternity overalls, all of which are now shorts. That yielded enough squares to affix almost all of our recent trip patches, so I started sewing.




I left two squares vacant under the “Georgia State Park Camper” master patch so we can collect and affix each State Park patch-lett as we collect them. I dated each patch with a Sharpie pen, because I’m too lazy to embroider dates. I zig-zagged all the seams and raw ends so it should put up with some handling and light use for the next dozen years or so until it will be finished (if ever?).

Some day, Papa Bear and I will be snuggled up together under our Travel Quilt in front of the fireplace, fondly remembering each of our family’s journeys. Won’t that be sweet?

Jeans-Of-Loved-Ones Quilt

You know what it's like when you pull on your oldest, best broken-in, most favorite pair of jeans? How snug, and soft, and comfortable, and friendly, and "right" they feel? Well, that's what it feels like every time I slip under this quilt, times ten.



I made this quilt many years ago, back in my single days. I had visited my father and step-mother at their home in Arizona, and my stepmother was in the process of quilting (see note below) a denim quilt she had pieced together. She had gathered up the worn-out jeans and the cut-off legs of jeans-now-shorts from a variety of folks she knew and loved, cut those bits into squares, pieced them all together, and was in the final stage of completing her quilt. She was quilting it by hand, so it was likely to take a while to finish, but could be gently used in the meantime, so it was lying on their bed. It was such a lovely idea, and the fabric from the long-worn-and-loved jeans was so soft and broken-in, it was nearly irresistable. So, upon returning home, I engaged in a quest to collect jeans.


It did not take as long as I had anticipated to collect the materials. I contacted family and friends and asked them to send me any old jeans or cut-off-legs they had laying about, and cut up some of my own jeans that no longer fit or were not being worn. My dear soul-friend, Woo, was a significant contributor. The flower-print demin was from a pair of overalls she had handed down to me, and the plain demin with daisies were from a pair of my own jeans she had hand painted for me (believe me, I only gave up wearing those jeans when they became completely obscene to wear, even with leggings beneath). All the rest of the pieces I couldn't possibly identify, but every single piece was from someone I loved and cared about at that time in my life. The rainbow pattern was an acknowledgement of my own compulsive nature, and gives the quilt an essentially "placid" cast for me.


We're a "cut-offs" and "pass-em-down" kind of family. As comfortable as we are financially, I still can't bear to toss out or donating a perfectly good pair of jeans without first passing them down the line and/or making them into cut-offs if at all possible (please check out this article on the subject, one I am particularly fond of). And, every time I cut off the legs of a pair of the boys' jeans, I think about the next quilt they could go into. Weird, huh? The things moms think about while in the laundry room? Since I didn't really plan on making another demin quilt, I even sent a bunch of legs to IBOL in our bundles, because I just can't bear to let go of them. Really weird, huh?


So, here's my idea. Each time I whack off the legs of a pair of jeans, I put the ends into a box with that boys name on it. In ten years or so, I should have enough leg-ends to piece together a quilt. A quilt to be presented to them when they move out into the world on their own. A quilt made of their own worn-and-loved jeans. A quilt made of their own cherished childhood. Cool, huh?


So, whatcha all think?







Background Note: Creating a quilt generally follows these steps:

1. Cut out pieces, and sew them together to create the "top".


2. Layer the top, the batting, and the bottom (generally a full peice of fabric).


3. "Quilt" by sewing through all three layers. Traditional quilting is done by hand, one stitch at a time, and generally follows a particular design throughout. There are now machines specially designed to "quilt" quilts (which saves the largest chunk of time involved in creating a quilt), and can be done with intricate patterns. The above quilt was done using a modified technique, threading yarn through the center of each square and tying off one knot at a time, which takes much less time, but is not quite as secure. It has to be "reinforced" now and again, depending on how frequently it is washed.