The Story of "Into the Light" Wall Quilt
Into the Light
By R. Leslie Forbes
Time has the ability to change our perspective and as the saying goes “Timing is Everything”. When I moved to Osoyoos five years ago I felt isolated from many of my FAN friends in the Lower Mainland. An invitation from Emilie Belak to join her quilting group in Grand Forks came at the perfect time. One of the lovely ladies in this group was the vivacious Karen Thatcher who greeted me with “Hi, I’m Karen, I have a brain injury so please excuse any inappropriate thing I say.” Her personality was engaging, her attitude was enthusiasm on steroids and her energy was boundless. Living in Rossland, B.C. Karen was a keen nature lover, walker, new golfer, skier, teacher, and an accomplished art quilter.
As I got to know Karen, I realized that her accident, while on the job as a paramedic, would have defeated many as her recovery was brutal. She started quilting as part of her recovery. It was good therapy she told me but not so good first results. Not having a stash of fabrics nor the funds to acquire one immediately, Karen was truly resourceful. She contacted the Jimmy Pattison Group in Vancouver with help from a friend. She told me, “Men wear ties and there were many men in this organization.” She thought she might receive 500 ties. She sorely underestimated the response as weekly delivery of ties arrived for months. This led to Karen developing her own style cutting up these ties, mostly of the designer silk variety, to create her art often inspired by her walks in the woods or the town.
As FAN Members you will be familiar with Karen’s quilt “Finding Tranquility” juried into The Grand National and winning the Janome Award of Excellence. You would have noted that the sky and woods use her ties and snippet technique. As a member of CQA/ACC Karen had many of her quilts juried into the National Juried Show. You may remember “The Getaway” winning an award in 2018 and “Finding Paradise”, both quilts featuring her hometown of Rossland.
Karen made the commitment to the Jimmy Pattison Group that she would donate a quilt to the BC Children’s Hospital and Canuck House. This led to many more donations to charitable groups for fund raisers.
I had invited Karen to my home to make a quilt using her techniques and I was surprised when she agreed as her cancer had advanced, and I assumed she would have neither the interest nor the energy. She suggested that I invite three others to join us for a three-day event as she said we would, in her words “build big and vertical.” Her one stipulation was that the resulting quilt would go to a charity as a fund raiser. So began the whirlwind of designing and fusing an endless variety of small pieces of fabric using up a full bolt of fusible. Karen’s energy did not diminish, her enthusiasm encouraging us to work faster, but for me it was the stories she told me of her life as we sat in the evenings exhausted which I found riveting. Time moved at warp speed and “Into the Light “was born.
We snipped, we painted cheesecloth in zip lock bags, we experimented painting birch trees using small cedar branches as our paint brushes on white silk (none of these made the final cut) as we tried to match the expectations of our mentor. As Karen would not accept payment for her time the four of us Gisela Carroll, Kathie Kirby, Bev Penny, and myself agreed to sponsor the training of three nurses in a third world country through Pan International in Karen’s name. We knew Karen would approve of this choice as it matched her giving nature and her work as a paramedic.
Bev suggested that we donate the quilt “Into the Light” to the Desert Valley Hospice Society of Osoyoos, Oliver and OK Falls as it covered the towns we were living in and she had a contact with this deserving group. The photo (above) shows us on the day we made the presentation. I hope each of you will purchase a ticket and help promote the raffle to raise funds for this very deserving organization.
At this time, I still feel a great sadness at Karen’s death in August 2020. She was true to her commitment to live life fully to the end and her not so subtle humour helped us deal with the inevitable ending. Making this quilt was my last block of time spent with a unique and vital person who was indeed a light in my life.
Raffle Tickets are $25 each or 5 for $100 and can be purchased online at: https://trellis.org/wallquiltraffle
By R. Leslie Forbes
Time has the ability to change our perspective and as the saying goes “Timing is Everything”. When I moved to Osoyoos five years ago I felt isolated from many of my FAN friends in the Lower Mainland. An invitation from Emilie Belak to join her quilting group in Grand Forks came at the perfect time. One of the lovely ladies in this group was the vivacious Karen Thatcher who greeted me with “Hi, I’m Karen, I have a brain injury so please excuse any inappropriate thing I say.” Her personality was engaging, her attitude was enthusiasm on steroids and her energy was boundless. Living in Rossland, B.C. Karen was a keen nature lover, walker, new golfer, skier, teacher, and an accomplished art quilter.
As I got to know Karen, I realized that her accident, while on the job as a paramedic, would have defeated many as her recovery was brutal. She started quilting as part of her recovery. It was good therapy she told me but not so good first results. Not having a stash of fabrics nor the funds to acquire one immediately, Karen was truly resourceful. She contacted the Jimmy Pattison Group in Vancouver with help from a friend. She told me, “Men wear ties and there were many men in this organization.” She thought she might receive 500 ties. She sorely underestimated the response as weekly delivery of ties arrived for months. This led to Karen developing her own style cutting up these ties, mostly of the designer silk variety, to create her art often inspired by her walks in the woods or the town.
As FAN Members you will be familiar with Karen’s quilt “Finding Tranquility” juried into The Grand National and winning the Janome Award of Excellence. You would have noted that the sky and woods use her ties and snippet technique. As a member of CQA/ACC Karen had many of her quilts juried into the National Juried Show. You may remember “The Getaway” winning an award in 2018 and “Finding Paradise”, both quilts featuring her hometown of Rossland.
Karen made the commitment to the Jimmy Pattison Group that she would donate a quilt to the BC Children’s Hospital and Canuck House. This led to many more donations to charitable groups for fund raisers.
I had invited Karen to my home to make a quilt using her techniques and I was surprised when she agreed as her cancer had advanced, and I assumed she would have neither the interest nor the energy. She suggested that I invite three others to join us for a three-day event as she said we would, in her words “build big and vertical.” Her one stipulation was that the resulting quilt would go to a charity as a fund raiser. So began the whirlwind of designing and fusing an endless variety of small pieces of fabric using up a full bolt of fusible. Karen’s energy did not diminish, her enthusiasm encouraging us to work faster, but for me it was the stories she told me of her life as we sat in the evenings exhausted which I found riveting. Time moved at warp speed and “Into the Light “was born.
We snipped, we painted cheesecloth in zip lock bags, we experimented painting birch trees using small cedar branches as our paint brushes on white silk (none of these made the final cut) as we tried to match the expectations of our mentor. As Karen would not accept payment for her time the four of us Gisela Carroll, Kathie Kirby, Bev Penny, and myself agreed to sponsor the training of three nurses in a third world country through Pan International in Karen’s name. We knew Karen would approve of this choice as it matched her giving nature and her work as a paramedic.
Bev suggested that we donate the quilt “Into the Light” to the Desert Valley Hospice Society of Osoyoos, Oliver and OK Falls as it covered the towns we were living in and she had a contact with this deserving group. The photo (above) shows us on the day we made the presentation. I hope each of you will purchase a ticket and help promote the raffle to raise funds for this very deserving organization.
At this time, I still feel a great sadness at Karen’s death in August 2020. She was true to her commitment to live life fully to the end and her not so subtle humour helped us deal with the inevitable ending. Making this quilt was my last block of time spent with a unique and vital person who was indeed a light in my life.
Raffle Tickets are $25 each or 5 for $100 and can be purchased online at: https://trellis.org/wallquiltraffle