I’d completely forgotten about the denim work clothes quilt top in the old trunk outside my bedroom. It was a few years ago, the day I dragged out the sewing machine and stitched together pieces of cut denim from a pile of old blue jeans.

The Gee’s Bend work clothes quilts had always intrigued me - in particular, the quilts of the Pettway family. Lutisha Pettway’s denim quilt was one of the first things I saw when I walked in to The Quilts of Gee’s Bend at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York. It was a revelation.

It wouldn’t be too difficult to make a top in the style of a Gee’s Bend quilt, I thought. Boy, was I wrong. My sewing skills are inferior, at best. Basically, I sew like a guy! The heavy denim and rickety old sewing machine didn’t help. As much as I told myself it didn’t need to be perfect - in fact, it needed to be imperfect - I was unhappy with the project.

So, I folded it up, put it in the trunk, and forgot all about it. Completely. The failed sewing experiment wasn’t even a memory. It was like it never happened. I continued to tell everyone I’d never made a quilt - and honestly believed what I was saying. Imagine the shock when I realized I had made a quilt top. Even more surprising - it wasn’t as bad as I thought!

This blog, the first in the second edition of my web site, is my mea culpa to the folks in the world of quilts and textiles. Discovering the lost quilt top made me want to finish the project. Maybe this year. But first, I’m going to study the Pettway family quilts.