Freewheeling Twists and Turns

What fun it has been to come online and see dozens and dozens and dozens of comments from readers dropping in for a chance to win Freddy and Gwen's new book "Freddy and Gwen Collaborate Again: Freewheeling Twists on Traditional Quilt Designs" and providing me with the opportunity to check out so many wonderful new bloggers!

If you created a link to my giveaway,(Free Give-Away: Freddy & Gwen Collaborate Again) I'm visiting your blog in return..between the giveaway offer last Friday to the 'Draw the Winning Name' one, this week. I'm grateful to meet so many new bloggers from around the world in all different time zones...that's the nice part of giving others with different days and nights ;) enough time to drop by and leave a comment..... and create a link back to my blog, that I can check out, too!

I've already contacted the production company Red Lips 4 Courage Communications so that Eileen can watch how much fun I'm having watching the books title spread around the world with the power of blogs and bloggers!!!

And when I'm not watching or reading, I'm dealing with all of the twists and turns that all of our lives take. Spending a day helping a daughter move.... and another day, sharing with other quilters the loss of one of our own group member's husband.....and now helping my brother (long distance) face a really daunting surgery to repair a third failed hip replacement in Eagle River, Alaska.

In the wink of an eye, one of our quilters went from having a husband with some chest pains, to being a widow. This kind and very dear man, did everything with his wife...took her fabric shopping, to quilt hops all over Oregon, to meetings, to sewing groups..he'd go have coffee and she'd sew with us for hours and hours. A better husband and spouse would be harder to find. And he died on the operating table, this last Friday during his 3rd bypass surgery. So very, very sad. She is devastated beyond words and is only just now beginning that hard journey of facing loss and unbearable grief. Send a prayer up for my friend and the sudden and unexpected loss of her husband.

And today, Monday.....please send up a prayer for my own brother facing an extremely tricky surgery involving a rod being put in his back to support a third hip replacement that is not fitting properly and is so tight it is putting unbearable pressure on his sciatic nerve. I'm thinking the very best of positive thoughts and a relief to his own unbearable fear and pain. Please join your positive energies with mine for him, as well.

These are simply the hard twists and turns of all of our lives. But always, we have the caring of each other and the spirit of togetherness and support. And always, always...we have the joy of life, the things that we can do to be happy, and help others share in happy times, and the ability to share our joy by giving to others.

So, today, as I go off to sew with my small Monday quilting group, I am happy to have finished this small 'Twists and Turns' quilt that is a scrappy creation of a sort of 'Disappearing Happy Blocks '...big blocks shown, then all cut up into quarters and re-arranged in a haphazard, free-wheeling fashion.

I'm off to quilting today....banded together by the unity of women who understand life's twists and turns. Continue to join me in my on-going Virtual Quilting Bee For Charity The binding goes on a string quilted/mile-a-minute combination, that I'm working on now. It will keep my hands busy and fill up my heart with its brightness.

LINKS:
Liberated Quilting
Liberated Quilting Challenge
Liberated Quilting: Free Patterns, Blocks, and Tutorials
Word Play (Quilts)