On August 1, 1924, my grandparents on my mother's side got married. (Only in the last few days did I start wondering how much of their attention was directed towards the first Paris Olympics back then…? Olympics being an importanst part of my family history, but that is a different story.) Fifty years later we celebrated their Golden Wedding anniversary with a boat tour on the steamer on Lake Ratzeburg.
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| My grandparents as the jubilee couple in front of the brick cathedral. My grandmother absolutely loved this Norwegian cardigan and wore it until it virtually fell to pieces, at which point my mother sat down, copied the pattern in colored pencils and we then proceeded to recreate the piece. I got to do the major part, knitting the body and the top part after the body had been joined with the sleeves, which my mother had made. We knit with rather different gauge, so it was a bit of an awkward piece in the end, definitely the result of a labor of love rather than a beautiful piece... |
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| A document of family history: my cousin on the left, me, my father, my two brothers and my aunt who was living in Eastern Germany and had received permission to come for this celebration. Despite the adults' efforts of persuasion she refused to 'stay in the West' despite the fact that her marriage was on the rocks already. She did not want to be dependant on anybody and thus faced another 15 years behind the iron curtain because after separating from her husband she never was never again given a permit to travel and reunite with her parents, until the Wall came down. By then both my grandparents had passed away. |
Having
recently moved ‘back’ to Ratzeburg I thought I would do a very personal commemoration of that event by taking that same boat ride, only it could not
happen on August 1, so I went a week before.
I just love this lake and am very happy that I decided to go for this big change in my life. Even if it meant that there is some upheaval going on right now and I still don’t know when that will end…
The day
after that boat ride I went south to see my family and continue packing up our
house for the grand move in the end of September. The big spinning wheel and
the big sewing machine have already been transferred to the new apartment and
my possibilities for making and creating have slimmed down. But since there is no time for that right now anyway I would rather have these two items transported securely by ourselves, and not trusting them to the moving services team.
But I had already shipped my contribution to this year’s SAQA Benefit Auction, which will take place in September. As readers of this blog may have heard my last two contributions did not fare exactly as one would have wished – two years ago my piece sold at the last minute, a few days before Christmas, from the SAQA store, and last year I took my piece with me at the end of Houston Quiltfestival and then gifted it to a good friend of mine.
However, I was early in making mine this year. I managed to ensure some clandestine shipment option early on, saving a number of euros in postage, and had a secret contributor who kindly shipped the little item from within the US. It has a two-digit-inventory number in the listing (not that that is something to be particularly proud of, but I noticed when I scrolled through last night.) Now I am hoping that this year’s piece will be a little more successful.
It was crafted from leftover blocks and pieces in my boxes, feeding creative juices after the pandemic, which consequently found its way into the title as “p.C” (meaning ‘post Covid’).
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| Small Study in Blue and Yellow (p.C.), 2024 |
Let’s see how it fares… You can preview the auction pieces here: https://www.saqa.com/auction
Uta, I love your piece for SAQA benefit auction. It is so fresh.
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