Mark's Quilts....

I want you to meet Officer Mark Vasquez of the Manhattan Beach, California police force.

By the time he was done with them, people used to thank Mark for giving them tickets. Really!  He conveyed his genuine interest in peoples' safety, and he was funny.  Who could resist that smile?

...and here is his family...

This is my favorite picture of the Vasquez family: Mark, his wife Lee, and daughters Madison and Ashley.  It captures their spirit!
Mark and Lee fell in love in high school; I think Lee was 15 and Mark was 16.  Because Lee is my "niece-in-law" (my brother-in-law and sister-in-law's daughter), over the years I've watched Mark and Lee go through college--each on atheletic scholarships--get married, and have their children together.  Their love has been a joy to the whole family, and to everyone who has known them.

Always, Mark was upbeat, energetic, full of strength.  So when he was diagnosed with Multiple Myeloma (a cancer of the blood) four years ago, he took it on like the Superman he was.  He underwent arduous treatments, raised money for research for a cure, continued to work as long as he could, and even served as his daughter's softball coach this spring before his body could no longer tolerate treatment and he died. 

At his funeral, the Chief of the Manhattan Beach Police told the hundreds of us gathered that Mark in his six years of service on the force touched more people than he himself had in thirty years as a police officer.  Knowing Mark, we all knew this humble police chief had spoken the truth.

So you can imagine what an honor it is for me to be making memorial quilts for Lee, Madison, Ashley, Manny--Mark's dad--and Don, Lee's dad.  I've been working with Mark's extensive t-shirt collection and some of his other garments, with the goal of creating each of them a cozy blanket to wrap up in, full of Mark's energy and memories.

Here are some of the tshirts...it gives you a little insight into the life of a committed policeman....

Mark trained hard, had fun, and on the serious side, he definitely took care of business.

I used my rotary cutter to trim out the shirts.

....until I had a pile of the graphics.

Because Lee has continually thought of these quilts as "blankets", I decided to make them as cozy as I could. I am appliquing the tshirt graphics onto thick polar fleece, then will machine quilt them.  Technically, this makes the most sense to me too, rather than trying to interface and then piece all those knits, and then layer them with batting and backing.

So I've started on Manny's blanket first (Lee sent me five boxes of shirts and other garments of Mark's, specifically chosen for each person)....

I laid out the main elements first directly onto the polar fleece, and then filled in the horizontal and verticle spaces with fabrics from other garments, pinning everything into place.

The next step is to hand baste everything down.

Then I will machine applique over the basting, and then machine quilt overall.  A binding will finish the blanket.

I've been thinking a lot about Manny (shown here) and Mark, of course, as I work....about fathers, and how great they are.

I did suffer an accident, unrelated, in the last week...burned my left thumb quite badly making jam!  So my work on this project has been slowed down considerably for the moment.  But it is what will be going on here for the next several weeks.  It is good work, and I am so happy to be doing it.