Many many many years ago, when I was pretty new to quilting, I signed up for a class at the Vermont Quilt Festival. It was about clothing design and it was with Jean Ray Laury. (I also remember the person who sat next to me signed up thinking she was going to get personally fitted for a perfectly fitted master pattern, and I remember showing her the class description before the class started – um, no that’s not what this is about.)

It was an interesting class about using cut out windows shaped like our garment outlines to place design and colors and we designed a lot more things than any of us ever would make. Jean was full of fun and encouragement and kept everyone moving along trying out new things, and commenting on why some things might work better than others design-wise.

At that point I probably knew Jean through her writings in Quilters Newsletter Magazine and probably through her books, especially The Creative Woman’s Getting-It-All-Together at Home Handbook.

Back then, that was pretty darn serious stuff. Jean made it seem so natural that one might, despite being a woman, focus on one’s art while balancing family and relationship things, that you might carve out space and time and energy to keep doing what was important to you. And that it was important to do that.

She often used simple designs in her work, often using those designs to say important and serious things, and just as often they might make you smile.

Jean Ray Laury died this week and will be missed by all the many people she helped get going in the world of quilting and outside of it.

In this article, it is noted:

Her most recent local project was an installation at the new headquarters of the San Joaquin River Parkway and Conservation Trust: five 9-foot banners that depict, in alluring colors, the array of plants, wildlife and other inhabitants of the river region. The project took two and a half years.

“I can’t imagine any commission that could be more fun or more rewarding than this one,” she told The Bee.

Sounds just like her and busy and happy right up the end.