Mrs. Jackson's Wallhanging

I am not sure what happened with this post. I thought I posted it with all the other teacher gift posts from last school year, but maybe I didn’t….


This is Jordan’s Kindergarten teacher Mrs. Jackson. I have to say she has been one of my favorites! I am so glad that Squish got to have his first school experiences with her. She is a true gem and good hearted person. I mean really, you have to be a certain kind of person to even WANT to be in a room of screaming 5 years olds all day, every day right? Well, she not only does it but she is good at it and gets them to really learn great things. My son will forever be a better person for having her as a chapter of his life, I am sure of it.

He couldn't wait to give it to her.

Quilting Details

As much as possible, I try to include the kids in whatever gifts are made for the teachers as I want the gift to be from them as much as it is a ‘thank you’ gift from me. On a shopping trip one day I had found this Mayfly Mischief fabric by Clothworks. I thought ‘Oh that is soooooo cute! I NEED to make something with that”. But since I try to not buy fabric that doesn’t have a purpose (batiks and stripes not withstanding) I resisted buying it. This was before I had met Mrs. Jackson. She is one of those ‘Dr Seuss’ type of people. Everything has a song or funny poem attached to it and I can just see her owning a Cat in the Hat style hat. That is what this fabric panel reminded me of. So I took Squish to the store with me one day and asked him if he thought she would like it. He said ‘she would LOVE it, can we make her something to put on the wall?’ Good enough for me…I bought the panel as well as enough coordinating fabrics to make something…all thought I didn’t know what yet.

Squish and Mrs. Jackson on graduation day.

What possessed me to just start making half square triangles I am not sure. I HATE making them! I usually love the end results that comes from things made with them but the actual, cutting and sewing and pressing and then trimming that is required makes me cranky. But alas, that is what I did…just whipped up a bunch of them. That morphed into pinwheels, which is one of those things I just love that is sadly made up entirely of half square triangles. So that was that, now I had this big stack of pinwheels…what next? Start with the panel, add some borders, slap on the pinwheels, then some more borders and viola…a wall hanging. Then I realized that I had 2 panels and just about enough blocks to make a second one so guess what? This one has an exact twin. I saved the second one to put in our local quilt show and it ended up in our guild’s calendar.

Jordan with Mrs. Taylor, the classroom assistant teacher.

The quilting was fun too. I am sure there is more quilting than necessary on it but who cares, it is hanging on a wall right? The thread is a beautiful shimmer variegated thread that I had been looking for a home for as well. With lots of loops and more pinwheels and some accenting on the center panel. Over all I am pretty pleased with this one, I hope it finds a good home with Mrs. Jackson.

Jordan and Rodrigo

Matthew, Joradan and DJ

Kinley and Jordan (his first crush)