In the life of a quilter one gets very used to the reactions of people when you give them a quilt. They are either blase about it and you wonder why you bothered OR they are blown away by your kindness, let alone the awesomeness of the quilt itself. But very rarely does the quilter get to be on the other side of that relationship.
I've been there once before, when my SIL gave The Monster's baby quilt. It's pretty cool (the feeling and the quilt).
At Quilt Market, however, I got that feeling twice. And even though I'm friends with quilters I hardly expected it. To be fair, the quilts weren't for me. They are Nikolai's quilts.
We kept trying to get a picture of Rashida with Nicky. It turns out someone was always crying...
Then, on our last night together Amanda and I retreated to the hotel room. We sat chatting as I nursed the baby and we signed bookplates. After the energy and crowds of Market it was nice to finally have some time to reflect and be together. It was, after all, only the second time we'd been together. And she presented Nikolai with an awesome quilt. She knows me so well that the design was perfect, beyond it being a slab quilt. In writing the book we always pushed each other and always responded. Maybe she didn't mean the symbolism, but she put purple in it and it is all solids. That accounts for one push from me and one from her.
And now, my beautiful crazy boy has some gorgeous love to cuddle with that come from dear friends. He's got no choice, that kid, he's the son of a quilter, surrounded by quilters, and buried in quilts.