My journey as a quiltivist began six decades ago, when, as an eight-year-old, I joined my mother and her sisters around a wooden quilt frame to make a Sunbonnet Sue bedspread. I could stitch Bear Paw, Flying Geese, and Nine Patch quilt blocks before I could recite the multiplication tables. My American flag quilts are mixed-media assemblages of textiles, needlepoints, embroideries, and tobacco insert felts; constructed with imagery from vintage comic books, racist advertisements, war propaganda posters, pinup girl calendars, and Old Glory wartime prints. My mother quilted to give back to her family, church, and community. My quilts also serve a communal purpose: giving voice to the dispirited and the downtrodden.

 "Where the spirit does not work with the hand, there is no art." ~Leonardo da Vinci