Two of my quilts, Daylily #2 and Fireworks, are in the July AAQI auction.

Fireworks was inspired by some journal entries by my mother, Marion , written in 1937 when she was 14 years old.

Sunday, July 4, 1937
Independence Day
Shot fireworks all day long. Had one swell time.  Laura and Dickee are staying over till tomorrow.  When it was dark we shot off a lot of fireworks which we had a lot of.  Got ice cream after all was done.

Monday, July 5, 1937
Laura went home today but Dick is going to stay till  Saturday.  After supper went to Crystal Lake to see the fireworks display. There also was a carnival there.  Dick, Dolores, and I went on a lot of rides at the carnival.  The fireworks were swell. Everyone says they were the best they had ever seen. For the finale there were 50 rockets in air at once. Got to bed at 1:00 o’clock A.M.

Here’s Fireworks:

Here’s Daylily #2:

My mother’s parents were avid gardeners, especially in their retirement years.  My mother was also an avid gardener, a writer of gardening books and a photographer, and my father liked working in the yard.  I didn’t inherit any of their gardening talents, but my mother got me started taking photographs when I was about 10.

From my grandmother Pauline’s journals: “April 29, 1950: 33 degrees out. Marion and I got back last night at 8:30 from that fine trip south.  In Memphis, Natchez and New Orleans it was full summer with loveliest trees and flowers.  Arriving here—snowflakes and cold.”

I made this quilt starting with a photo that I took of a daylily in my back yard–daylilies are easy to grow and usually the deer don’t eat them all.  I edited the photo in Photoshop to make it more ‘painterly’, printed it on fabric and then quilted it.

You can see these quilts and all the others in the July auction here.

Every stage of life is interesting, even this one. —
Marion, about 2002, and experiencing the effects of Alzheimer’s

 Baby you’re a firework
Come on let your colors burst
Katy Perry