Aluminum Loaf

So, Badger's birthday came around last month while he was still off sailing the Arctic Ocean and stomping around on ice sheets to his heart's content as part of the crew of the US Coast Guard Cutter HEALY. I knew that I would be taking a trip to Alaska to join him for a week soon after his birthday, and I wanted to make him a special quilt. I'd started quilting in June, shortly before he left, and he's missed a few of them since he got underway, so this one had to be extra-special. It took me a few days to figure out what he most loves/misses about being out to sea, but it soon came to me: HE MISSES HIS AIRSTREAM! (Duh.) So I spend a number of weeks in September working on this two-sided, openable, scale model quilt of our Airstream. I gave it to him while we were together in Seward, Alaska a few weeks ago, and he and Makeshift felt right at home beneath it. It has since been installed on the ship where it is having the trip of a lifetime (or rather, the first of what will be many to come).

Here are a few more pictures of what the final reproduction looks like. Our Airstream is 25-feet long and this quilt reaches five feet from tip to tail—a one-fifth scale model. It has flair that is specific to port and starboard sides; logos, lights, awnings, windows, water, refrigeration, furnace, outside shower, electricity hook-ups, outdoor outlets, hot water heater, et cetera ... (even the blue pull-tabs for our gorgeous blue-striped awnings are there if you know where to look). I apologize for the somewhat rumpled look, when we took these pictures the quilt had been in a very tightly-packed travel bag for a number of days.