2+2=4

It's time to put 2010 behind me.

To be perfectly frank, it was one of the worst years I've ever had. As a couple, Hubby and I both agree that not much can get worse. (There was a lot to celebrate too.) We weathered long and frequent separations, there was the fall while skiing and the recovery that still continues, there were major life changes and serious adjustments for all, there were home renos that went no where, there was Hubby's painful battle with his own injuries, there were changes all around. And there was more.

This quilt came out of the more. In the last 6 months of the year I experienced two miscarriages. One was quite shocking and ended up with me in the hospital on our way home from a funeral. The other was more typical and certainly less traumatic, but hard to deal with because it happened while Hubby was out of town. I'd had a miscarriage before, in the months before The Monster was conceived. But after everything this year I found these two particularly rough to recover from - physically and emotionally.

This quilt was started this summer, shortly after my hospital experience. The image of the crayons in my hand was always in the back of my head, percolating with options and happiness over how they came to be. At that point I also started thinking about the questions nurses and midwives ask when you become pregnant. How many children do you have? How many pregnancies? 2+2=4

Some doodling, some planning on the computer, and I just started sewing. As December progressed there was no option but to finish this quilt. I needed to put it, and everything else behind me. It was a just because quilt, but it was also more. But I don't want to put a lot of meaning to it. Finishing it, however, is symbolic of putting the past behind me.

I tend to hold on to things, even when they are pulling me under the water. Some sort of sick self pity keeps me grasping to hang on when the surface is right there. If I just let go I can get to shore and walk ahead, drying off as I go, ready for the next adventure. Hubby always said that if we let everything that happens get to us we would never get out of bed in the morning. Well, I spent a lot of time trying not to get out of bed over the last 6 months. It's time to stop doing that, it's time to let go and swim for shore.

The quilt is done. It isn't a particularly pretty quilt, nor is it one of my best efforts. I was so anxious to finish that I didn't square it up and the edges are very wavy. The quilting is uneven. My points could have matched a bit better in spots. But its done. With the last stitches of the binding, finished with my girls helping me on New Year's Eve, I actually do feel ready for the next adventure.

Bring on 2011!