Fund Raising Quilt for Jason Tennies

It was a beautiful Saturday morning in Southern California.  The skies were clear & blue, the temperature in the morning was in the high 60s.
My friends, Dave & Linda Tennies, lost their son Jason last September, due to the rapid onset of mental illness.  He was a bright & creative young man.  He was getting ready to transfer to a 4-year college, was a wonderful musician & had even started his own business teaching guitar. 


On Saturday, February 5th, a tree was planted in his honor, in a park near where he died.  I would guess that over 50 people showed up for the ceremony.  Jason's music was playing while the crane lifted the tree into its prepared location.  When it was in place, Dave talked a bit about mental illness, and that he & Linda were working on a fund raiser:  the Chino Valley Walk for Mental Health in Memory of Jason Tennies.  They have a location & the okays from the city, and are working on getting the local press & politicians involved.  Already the four main mental health associations are involved with the event as well - the first time all four have been involved in the same event, as far as I know.  For more information about the walk, there is a brand new website:  http://www.jasontennies.org/


I told Dave that I would make a quilt for it, and asked what colors Jason liked & he said "purple & green".  Right then I knew that Sara would work with me on it - purple is her favorite color.  ;^)  


I spent several hours on Monday working on a design for the quilt.  I have been wanting to do a Disappearing Nine-Patch for a while, so I decided to incorporate that into the quilt, using those blocks to surround the center which will have an appliqued guitar.  I want to make the D9P blocks with purple, green & a black and white musical notes print. The first planning meeting for the walk was yesterday, and Dave & Linda were very happy with the design.  :^D

After the meeting, Sara & I went to Ginger's Quilt Shoppe in Upland, and found the perfect fabrics.  We'll be starting on it next weekend.  Wish us luck! 


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Don't forget, I have a little giveaway going on until the 17th!  You can find it here.