I was moved to add my own memories of her handiwork after reading my friend Ardeana Hamlin’s “walk down memory lane” in her Aug. 7 “By Hand” column. As she described her sewing phases, our shared memory bank kicked in when she moved from the Twiggy look to the sewing projects of a young mother decorating her home and sewing clothing for her children. I can still picture her sons wearing their cowboy shirts and her cozy home, just up the road from mine, filled with her handiwork.

During our almost 30 years of friendship, she has been the bearer of beautiful gifts to me and my family; a hand-knit sweater of graceful proportions made from my sheeps’ yarn, a baby quilt for my daughter, delicately quilted with tiny lambs in each square, a children’s vest of her own design with frolicking lambs on a foreground of green with blue above representing the blue skies over our farm in Hampden, a Hawaiian sock doll (after we returned from a family trip to the islands) and a cross-stitched “Home Sweet Home” piece for our new home in Orono.

Over the years, I brought to her skirts with torn kick pleats, jackets needing sleeves shortened, a sweater needing moth hole repair, curtains needing hems. I am certain that her wide circle of friends have all been touched in the same way.

Reading her column is always a joy; her designing and sewing descriptions often take me back to my childhood when my mother made all my clothes and my wardrobe was the envy of my friends. She and my mother were immediate soul sisters when they met, though from different generations, because of their love of making gifts for others “by hand.” Thank you to the powers that be at the Bangor Daily News that this textile artist and gifted writer can combine both of her talents to enrich your readers’ lives.

Cathy Marquez

Orono