Ithaca League of Women Rollers

This patch came to me in the mail on the day the first exhibit opened.  Psychodelic Nightmare made this square to represent the Ithaca League of Women Rollers, with their two teams, The Blue Stockings and the Suffer Jets, flanking the league logo.

It was nicely poetic to get a fresh square just as the first section of the quilt made its debut. I'm now that much closer to covering all of New York!

Nora'Easter

When I first saw Nora'Easter at a skate clinic, I was sure I was completely screwed. I remember skating behind her in the rink and watching her comfort on wheels and I knew that the bar was very high for tryouts. I lucked out and there was room for both of us in the class of 2007/2008. She became a Cosmonaughty, and I later became a Nutcracker. Still, we'll always be fellow freshies as far as I'm concerned.

I enjoyed one great season with her as a member of BDD before she moved to Maine. It rocked watching her rep the Cosmos, and I was really sad to see her leave BDD. I admit to having a lingering hope she'll get sick of all the moose and bears in her current home and move back to the rude drivers and packed subway cars of Boston. We miss you!

Montreal Roller Derby

One of my goals at Eastern Regionals was to get a square from Montreal Roller Derby, the sweethearts of WFTDA. After giving The Rev the stink eye every time he passed my vendor table, he responded in the classiest way possible - he have me his sweatshirt and let me use my seam ripper to remove this lovely back patch.

Now The New Skidz on the Block are represented and I'm several different flavors of excited. I also still have The Rev's sweatshirt, which I will totally return the next time we're in the same room.

Suburbia Roller Derby

I got this square a couple of days before leaving for Derby in the Burbs, WFTDA's 2010 Eastern Regional Tournament. It seemed fitting to have a league patch for the league that was hosting, and I was happy to have it on my vendor table for everyone to see.

This patch was made by Meredith, a freshmeat skater with Suburbia who is apparently a quilter and all around fabric ninja. "The ladies of Suburbia rock!" according to Meredith. "I'm still just a meatie working through my scrimmage hours, but I've drunk the Kool Aid and I'm proud to have them kick my ass around every practice."

Her skill totally shows in her craftsmanship. Holy crap this thing is well made. It got a TON of attention at the tournament, and everyone wanted to pick it up and examine the stitching up close.  Thanks Suburbia Roller Derby for being outstanding hosts during Derby in the Burbs, and thanks Meredith for making such a beautiful patch. You both rock. Nicely done.

Teamwork

My family will kill me for posting this photo, but I'm doing it anyway:

Pepper's not my sister, but she's on my team, so that counts.

I love looking through old photos in the "quilt" folder on my desktop because I find little gems like these. The above photo was taken just after we'd finished de-installing the first exhibit of the quilt at MassArt this summer. I couldn't possibly have taken it all down without them. Pepper, my mom, Pelvis, and my dad rubbed their fingers raw removing the vinyl letters from that wall. I'm extremely lucky they didn't kill me after the power failed and the heat guns stopped working. 

Mike and Melinda, saving my butt.

These other photos were from the same exhibit, but aren't by any means an exhaustive record of everyone who deserves major thanks for doing pain-in-the-ass work. To the left, there's Mike and Melinda, who came at the last possible second to help me re-hang the quilt after it fell. They dropped plans and zipped over into a land of no parking for a job that wound up taking only ten minutes. Below is a photo of my skater sister, Shay, and my teammate, Speed Metal, who helped me pin hundreds of letters and envelopes to a very hard, unforgiving wall. They had hands of steel.

I've had SO MUCH HELP with this project it simply blows my mind. Of course, the people who contribute squares have made the quilt  actually happen and always have my thanks. However, my thanks in this post are to the people who responded to last-minute "please save me" Facebook posts and text messages and offered me a different kind of help - the kind involving a lot more wobbly ladders, cut fingers, sore legs, and free pizza.

Shay and Metal risking their
fingers to numerous push-pins.

They've allowed me to sleep a little bit more because I didn't have to stay up all night installing an exhibit. They've allowed me to squeeze in a bathroom break or a nap while they watched the display at a tournament. They allowed me to be on time for class because they took over machine-quilting large chunks of border material together. They let me see my family because, well, they WERE my family and they came to help on oppressively hot summer days in a tiny gallery with no functioning windows.

Working on this giant beast of a project has really hammered home how many wonderful people I have in my life. I wish I had more photos of these acts of mega kindness and herosim on a small scale. I guess I'll have to settle for saying "thank you so much" and "you know who you are."

Merch

I bit the bullet and got a few small items to sell. Traveling to show the quilt ain't cheap, so any proceeds raised by selling quilt merch will go towards plane tickets to tournaments, far-away-bouts, and other display opportunities. If you want to see the quilt visit a town near you, help a derby sister out and get some quilty accessories for your skate bag, or jacket.

Buttons are $1.00

1 inch round buttons

Stickers are $1.50

2.5" round stickers
good for indoor and outdoor use

Patches are $5

3" round, iron-on patch

If I sell enough of these I'll probably make some sweet shirts too. If you want one of these before I finish setting up a little online store part of the site, email me at rollerderbyquilt (at) gmail (dot) com. I accept paypal and will ship anywhere. Customers pay shipping and handling.