A couple's life history - on a quilt!

The large patch-work quilt was hand-sewn over eight months and featured moments in their lives as well as personal good luck messages from friends and family from all over the country.

The intricate, beautifully designed and detailed quilt was the brainchild of one of the couple's sons, Mark. He asked his wife Debbie to make a quilt representing 40 years of his parents' marriage.

But the labour of love didn't start with the first stitches. Getting the information and contacting friends was the biggest problem, as well as picking fabric designs which held memories for the couple.

Mark and Debbie, from Little Common, contacted friends and family from as far away as Yorkshire and sent them little squares of material and a special pen for writing an anniversary message. Debbie then embroidered the message and sewed the square into the quilt.

Said Val, of Allen Way: "I didn't twig until afterwards, but had wondered why Mark and Debbie had been acting very strangely over the last few months.

"On one occasion Debbie asked me to have a look around the garden and kept me out there for a long time with different excuses. Now I know it was because Mark was going through my phone book for names and addresses. Another time I called round to Debbie's house unexpectedly and she took an awfully long time to answer the door. Apparently she had the quilt material laid out in the lounge and had to clear it away before letting me in.

"I think it is a marvellous gift. I cried when they gave it to us. I keep looking at it and see something different each time. It is so beautifully done. I shall always treasure it."

The quilt also features a London bus, number 157, to signify when Syd worked for London Transport, an intricate anchor for when he was in the Navy on HMS Victorious; a stiletto-heeled woman's button-through boot to mark Val's 23 years' work in the shoe trade; a watering can for her fondness for gardening, and two entwined wedding rings, with the dates of their marriage and anniversary; and a central diamond design with their three children Debbie, Mark and David, at each corner and their two grandchildren's names at the base.