This quilt square is in honor of our son Michael. The white background is made from the shirt he wore to work. He wore it the day he was killed. He was a host at our neighborhood Perkins Restaurant. The blue plaid fabric is from a pair of boxers he owned…and he did wear boxers everyday of his young adult life. The trombone is there to symbolize the instrument he loved to play as well as the instrument of music he was in our lives. The First Place patch is a patch he and his marching band were awarded for winning the Atlantic Coast Championship in 2005. It is placed beneath his picture because he was also “First Place” in his class…Valedictorian of Pocono Mountain West High School 2007, and because he has the first place in our hearts. The picture is one of his senior pictures taken by one of his good friends almost one year exactly before the day he died. The music notes with wings show my hope and certainty that he is with God in heaven, playing beautiful music with angels and saints and hopefully waiting for my husband and me. The hearts symbolize eternal, unconditional and ever-growing love for our son, and for the loving, pure son he was to us as well. The Mickey Mouse ears symbolize the many times we spent together as a family on vacation, and throughout our daily lives, as well as for Mike’s fondness for all things Disney. The dates shown are the date he entered this life, and the date he entered his eternal life. His birth date, 7/11, coincidentally symbolize the year he graduated from high school and the year he would have graduated from college. The butterfly buttons symbolize the transformation from this life to the next…the red rose, also a symbol of our eternal, undying love for Michael.
