Made in 2005
The day our first child was born, information on the delivery was scarce, so Rebecca tracked us down and roamed the hallways of the hospital. She found us just as we were being escorted to the NICU to see Ezra. Unfortunately, we weren't the happy family she was expecting to see; complications during delivery had deprived Ezra of oxygen for too long. He spent his short life in the NICU and died when he was 5 days old.
The day we came home from the hospital without him, Rebecca was there, somehow, right away. Same as in the hospital, she was our first non-family visitor. She delivered half a dozen Tupperware containers of extravagant food, said some gentle, sweet things to us, and left.
Some time passed, but I can't remember how much. It could have been two days or two weeks. Rebecca came back, and this time she brought Ezra's quilt with her.
Normally, when you give someone a quilt that you made for a happy occasion, they cry. It's actually an unwritten rule that you are supposed to cry when someone gives you a handmade quilt. When I received this beautiful quilt, all my tears were reserved for something else; I didn’t cry. I ruined Rebecca's perfect record, and she forgave me.
Ezra's is one of Rebecca's famed Alphabet quilts. Part of the fun is going through and naming the object in the block; where she gets Xylophone fabric, nobody knows. In the bottom corner she stitched "Ezra blessed the Lord." This is the beginning of a reading we heard together in church a week or two before he was born; I was so excited to see the word in print, I divulged our secret name to Rebecca.
I'm so glad his name is there, right on the front. It gives my family an excuse to remember him and talk about him whenever we play together on this quilt.
The day we came home from the hospital without him, Rebecca was there, somehow, right away. Same as in the hospital, she was our first non-family visitor. She delivered half a dozen Tupperware containers of extravagant food, said some gentle, sweet things to us, and left.
Some time passed, but I can't remember how much. It could have been two days or two weeks. Rebecca came back, and this time she brought Ezra's quilt with her.
Normally, when you give someone a quilt that you made for a happy occasion, they cry. It's actually an unwritten rule that you are supposed to cry when someone gives you a handmade quilt. When I received this beautiful quilt, all my tears were reserved for something else; I didn’t cry. I ruined Rebecca's perfect record, and she forgave me.
Ezra's is one of Rebecca's famed Alphabet quilts. Part of the fun is going through and naming the object in the block; where she gets Xylophone fabric, nobody knows. In the bottom corner she stitched "Ezra blessed the Lord." This is the beginning of a reading we heard together in church a week or two before he was born; I was so excited to see the word in print, I divulged our secret name to Rebecca.I'm so glad his name is there, right on the front. It gives my family an excuse to remember him and talk about him whenever we play together on this quilt.
Written by Jennifer Heinz (mom of Erza)
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