In August, I saw a post on a local Facebook group, from Melissa, who was looking to have memory items made, as her mother had sadly & unexpectedly passed away. I decided to comment & sent a link to a previous write up about the memory scrappies for Lawrence, I had made, with an offer to create memory scrappies for her.
Melissa, reached out to me describing her mom, Susan as Martha Stewart reincarnated, she could turn anything into a something & Melissa liked the fact that I had “unique craftiness” too. So thus, our creative venture began.
Normally, when I’ve made my memory scrappies, I will have at least one long face-to-face meeting with a loved one & several follow up discussions, in person or online, as I think of new questions, but this time around (Covid) all our conversations were online. Even though it was different, it had it’s benefits, the fact that everything was written down helped a lot. Melissa was wonderful at sharing memories both in words written & pictures shared. The love that Melissa had for her mum was abundantly obvious, it was quite beautiful to be privy to it & to capture it in the scrappies created.
As with all my scrappies, every creative decision made, happened for a reason. All of the fabrics used were Susan’s. I did use some interfacing & new polyfil, but everything that you see, carries memories of Susan. One continuing theme on each, were the eyes, all made from the same fabrics. They are green & brown, as I was told that Susan’s eye colour was green/brown.
Now, to talk about other features of each scrappie. The first scrappie, was nautical themed, the red striped shirt I later discovered, Melissa had given to her mom. I picked it because I wanted to capture Susan’s love of the ocean & it had a lovely boat anchor on it, which I wanted to feature. There was a blue shirt, that reminded me of the water, so I used that for the face on this one. The brown striped arm was my little nod to gardening as was the yellow (flowers, the sun) and then there was a green top (her favourite colour was green) that had a pattern on it that made me think of vines. The other leg, a mosaic pattern, was a nod both to artistic talents and to the way the water catches the light sometimes.
The next scrappie, made use of a star shirt, as the main fabric. Not only was Susan, one of a kind, just like the stars, but she was incredibly special to her family, who loved her very much, so, of course stars had to be included. This one features the mosaic fabric again, this time I used it to create a pocket. It isn’t easy to see, but the pocket features a puzzle piece, cut from the same fabric I used for the legs, in recognition of time spent making puzzles. The legs (& puzzle piece) are made from a gorgeous quilted jacket that made me think of a painting or beautiful garden, which had to be recognised. I also used a part of that jacket for all of the brown pupils within the eyes of each scrappie. There was a green top with zippered pockets on it that I decided to use for the backing fabric, incorporating the zipper into the design, because lets be honest, zippered pockets are awesome. Green being recognised as her favourite colour, again.
The third scrappie featured another pocket, this time only one though. The pocket was taken directly from the same jacket that I used in the previous scrappie for the legs (with nods to gardening & artistic talents) & I used a couple of other pieces of clothing to create a little heart & spade icon to recognise time spent playing cards, including Go Fish with one of her grandkids. It seemed apt to use a shirt that repeated the words je t’aime (I love you) in a heart shape on the back too. The red striped fabric from the nautical themed shirt of course tied in a love of the water & the yellow used, linked back to creativity, sunshine & time spent in the garden.
Melissa had actually only asked me to make 3 scrappies for each of her mom’s grandkids, but I really wanted to give her something a little extra, so I made her a little travel sized scrappie of her own, one that she could always take with her. I went back to my winking style for this one, because I wanted to capture some of her mums cheekiness. The heart shaped mosaic fabric was a purposeful little message of love, to symbolise the love that they both share for each other.
Here they are complete, together.
They’re a pretty cute little bunch, aren’t they?
Thank you for asking me to make these scrappies for your family Melissa. I hope that they bring lots of reminders of the wonderful memories you all have with your mom.
EXTRA Artist notes:
Each of my scrappie critters are made to be uniquely imperfect, just as all of us are. Some will have more noticeable stitching in places, in this case the nautical one does. They’re not symmetrical, appendages are not exactly the same in size or number on each. This is all done on purpose, our differences & imperfects are what make us who we are after all.