Finished!

I have finished the Mother’s Day Project embroidered name, sunflower and tools to represent the Air Force’s 1st LT Debra Banaszak.

I never thought I would find a cross-stitch pattern for tools, but I did. It was actually in a cross-stitch alphabet book that I had. So I added a wrench and a tape measure. I chose the tape measure because it made me think how we measure our own lives or someone else’s life. Like Sidney Poitier’s book, “The Measure of a Man.” Mr. Poitier’s father said that the measure of a man is by his children. How well he was a father to his children. If that’s the measure of any of us, male or female, Debra Banaszak’s parents are standing pretty tall right about now.

Even though the wrench and tape measure were the easiest stitching on this whole project for me, of course they were fraught with the most messing up! I started the wrench too close to the sunflower and had to rip out about 12 stitches. But of course they wouldn’t rip out very easily, so there’s a bit of a bulge where I screwed that up. I finally got it in the right spot, but it may be over to the left too far. I was trying to leave enough room for the tape measure, but somehow I didn’t get them centered properly. You know that saying, “measure twice, cut once”? It kept coming into my head as I kept ripping out stitches.

I think I’ve tried to avoid the heavier thinking about Debra, but with Memorial Day fast approaching, I will bring it to the front burner of my head. I think next weekend would be a splendid day to plant some sunflowers on her behalf. It was also pretty cool to finish my part of the project on May 20, which would have been my grandfather’s 106th birthday. He’s the other sunflower I told you about in an earlier post.

Peace.

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Sunflower: Progress

Some progress over the weekend with the sunflower part of my Mother’s Day project. I’m only doing half a sunflower, so I can put a wrench underneath. With the cross-stitch fabric, the stitching went a little easier. I stitch better if I have some guidelines. So it’s coming along.

I’m enjoying the progress. It makes me feel like 1st LT Debra Banaszak is not forgotten or forsaken. I hope she will be happy with the design I’m putting together. I hope it will fit into Anne’s plans well enough also. I don’t want to screw that up! The tote bags sound very neat. Very utilitarian, portable and something every woman needs and usually carries in some manner of speaking. I think Anne is very astute and tuned in to this fine project she has created, and how she came up with it and mobilized it so quickly is astounding to me.

Please visit the Mother’s Day Project site. This is something very important that we can do to memorialize some very important women.

What’s in a name?

This is tougher than I thought. With each stitch of Debra’s name, the needle going through the muslin almost feels like a stabbing of the heart. It’s so final. I have finished Debra’s name, and I am moving on to the sunflower. I’m hoping that will bring a happier feeling, that the sunflower will come to symbolize reaching for the sun, for the dreams that Debra can no longer dream, but that her life, her ultimate sacrifice, will give the rest of us appreciation and hope for the many freedoms we enjoy.

I was happy to learn that she liked sunflowers. I had been thinking, as we start our garden this year, of planting a couple of sunflowers, but for my grandfather. He was not a tall man, so I thought the sunflower would symbolize his height of character. The sunflower has always been a happy flower for me, swaying above everything else that can grow in a garden. Grandpa wanted his children and grandchildren to be tall. He got his wish. So now I will plant a few sunflowers for him, that he might watch over us from on high, and I will also plant a few for Debra, so that the plant she loved so much will live on for her and represent her to all who pass by. You know I’m going to tell them about her.

What’s in a name? Peace. Love. Spirit. You tell me.

Debra: Sunflowers and wrenches

I am working on my Mother’s Day Project name. I got the name from project founder Anne earlier this week, and it’s surprising what just a name can evoke. The name of the woman I am to memorialize in stitchery is “Debra Banaszak.” The first name is spelled like my 4 year old niece’s middle name. Her middle name is in honor of her mother’s sister, who passed away nearly 10 years ago — one of the most vibrant and amazing women I’ve ever met.

Anne’s letter that accompanied the muslin cloth with the name on it suggested we do a little research about our person. So I did a Google search, and learned that Debra had died in 2005. She was a 1st Lieutenant, and worked for the Air Force’s 1035th maintenance battalion that had been stationed in Kuwait at Camp Victory. She hailed from Bloomington, IL, and was 35 years old. She apparently died of “non-combat related injuries,” but apparently they had to launch an investigation into why she died because at the time little was known (or said).

Debra had a then-15 year old son, Mark. He chose to put sunflowers in her casket “because that was what she liked best.” Someone else said her entire kitchen was done in sunflowers.

Debra was also, it seems, single minded and very strong willed. Someone not to be deterred; intent on accomplishing the goal, whatever that goal may be. Sounds like a very good person to have around. I feel for her son, but he has inspired me.

Anne had said in her letter that we could add something in stitchery to our name if we wanted, but that it would be used perhaps elsewhere in the design. I took that to mean that if I embellished the name with some sunflowers and perhaps a wrench, that they might not show up right around the name. Which is fine. I’m not sure what Anne has in mind there, but I felt that it was worth asking her if I could add a sunflower and a wrench, but could I do it in cross-stitch fabric rather than the muslin? My hand stitching is awful, so any help or guidelines via fabric is always helpful and appreciated. I didn’t want to mess up Anne’s design, though, by introducing a new medium, so I wrote and asked if it was alright. She graciously gave me permission, and I found a sunflower pattern this evening, and am looking for a wrench pattern, although I think I could figure it out on my own if I have to.

And so the tribute stitchery for 1st LT Debra Banaszak continues. It makes me proud, sad, inspired and happy all at once.

Mother’s Day Project

I saw this on another blog, and it’s important enough to pass on. If you blog, and you read about Anne’s project and deem it worthwhile, please add a link to your blog. Pass it on!

She wants to do something to remember/memorialize the women who have died in the Iraq War — 79 to date.

The idea is that this won’t be done in time for Mother’s Day 2007 (i.e., May 13, 11 days from now!), so don’t panic. But please read and join in if you can. Anne’s Mother’s Day Project: http://threadingwater.wordpress.com/2007/04/29/the-mothers-day-project-i-need-your-help/

Although I haven’t been to the concentration camps in Germany as Anne has, I have visited the Normandy Beaches in France, a holocaust museum nearby (I think it’s in Caen), and the American Memorial Cemetary, also near the beaches. It’s hard to forget, and that’s the idea. There was an image at the museum that haunts me still, eleven years later. It’s of a young girl, blonde, looking directly at the camera, with a young man behind her. A Nazi soldier is putting a noose around the young man’s neck. The young girl already has the noose about her neck. She looks amazingly like my mother did as a young girl. You want to step through decades of time and pull them to safety, but you know that’s out of the question. Man’s inhumanity to man. Thoughtless, senseless. Help us not to forget any of these people! Please visit the link above and do what you can. Thank you!