My Heritage Emerges - The Explanation

For years, I have had a strong pull towards Irish things and Jewish things. I could never understand this pull. I love Irish music. I love Irish knitting. I even knit in a way no one taught me. Eventually, I saw the way I knit in a book about Irish knits and there was a photo of a woman knitting in exactly the way I knit.

After doing some massive searching for my family history, I discovered my father's side of the family is Irish. I began to wonder about genetic memory. I had always considered St. Patrick's Day a great day if one was Irish and an excuse to get drunk if one was not. Thinking I wasn't Irish, I ignored the day. After I learned I was Irish, I discoverd St. Patrick's Day is a wonderful day if one is Irish.

I had the same sort of pull towards things Jewish. My grandmother always told me that her mother was born in Germany and she spoke Hoch Duetsch - a very gramatically proper form of German. But the very little German that my grandmother spoke sounded so "off" to me after I had learned German in college. I kept looking and discovered that the German my grandmother knew was if fact Yiddish.

I made this quilt in shades of green to honor my Irish heritage - a heritage that had been hidden from me for more than 30 years. I used two greens of equal value in making the star to show that my Jewish heritage had also been hidden from me. I used a darker value of green to show the discovery of my heritage.

I like the comments I received on the quilt and I appreciate all the input I received. The quilt is saying what I had hoped it would say.

Now.... I get to square up the quilt, put on the binding and the sleeve in the back. I haven't decided where I'm going to hang it yet.