About Us
About Us
Lloyd Enterprises has been providing outstanding unique crafts since 1995. Our specialty is in the area of custom Memory T-shirts Quilts, Photo Quilts, Memorial Quilts, Memory Bears, and Memory Pillows. Our Customers value our uniqueness and the quality of our work.
Ruth Lloyd
Owner
Press
This article was published in the Fort Worth Star Telegram Arlington section on September 4, 2005.
Entrepreneur stitches together keepsake pieces
By Patricia Asaad
Special to the Star-Telegram
GRAND PRAIRIE - Each time Deborah Cox moved to a new home, she moved a box of her daughter's shirts.
Her daughter, Stefani Robertson, 15, died in a car crash in 1998, killed by a drunken driver. Although Cox didn't want to keep moving the box, she wasn't ready to part with its contents either.
Cox mentioned her dilemma to her friend, Ruth Lloyd, who had an idea for the shirts.
"When she was talking about how she kept moving around a box of her daughter's shirts, but she wasn't ready to get rid of them," Lloyd said, "it was like a light bulb came on in my head and I told her I'd make a quilt out of them."
Lloyd, 50, made her first quilt about a year ago. Since then she has made 13 quilts and started a business, Lloyd Enterprises, out of her home in Grand Prairie, making memory and memorabilia quilts.
Some of the shirts that customers have given her to make quilts include Little League shirts, football shirts and T-shirts from school sports or activities. Depending on the size of the quilt, Lloyd needs about 20 to 40 shirts or other items. The shirts don't have to have writing; sometimes customers choose Hawaiian shirts or other shirts with distinctive patterns. She can also incorporate the back pocket from a special pair of jeans or overalls.
Prices range from $150 for a small lap quilt to $600 and up for queen-sized quilts. For an additional fee, she can add pictures to the quilt squares. She also personalizes and signs each quilt in embroidery on the back. Once she has all the materials, Lloyd can finish a quilt in four to six weeks.
Lloyd asks that customers provide the clothing items and other fabric so they can choose their own colors. If they are not comfortable deciding, Lloyd will choose fabrics with them.
She had seen similar quilts at craft shows, but had not thought about learning to quilt until the conversation with Cox. Lloyd has loved craft work for years and has sewn since she was 8. When she decided to make a quilt, she bought a book and picked up the art quickly.
"I like doing this because it's so personal," she said. "It makes them feel so good when they get it."
Lloyd made a quilt for her neighbor, Roberta Sheffield, when Sheffield's husband, Mike Sheffield, died suddenly in 2004.
"My kids picked the shirts that were special to them," Sheffield said. "My son had been in scouts with him and my daughter had been in Indian Princesses with him, and they picked some of those shirts."
After other family members saw the quilt, they ordered five more from Lloyd. Sheffield said seeing the quilts has given her joy by reminding her of little things about her husband.
"He hunted, so everyone wanted a little bit of camo on theirs," Sheffield said. "He was really loving towards his family, so they've enjoyed having these little bits to remember him by."
It was difficult for Cox to part with her daughter's shirts because Lloyd would need to cut them into pieces. It took about a year and a half before she was ready.
Now Cox said she is glad she did it -- and grateful that Lloyd offered to make the quilt. She said it represents special memories of her daughter that she can display in her home rather than tuck away in a box.
"I didn't know how I was going to feel when she brought it to me," Cox said. "But it was the neatest thing she could have done for me because it was like having everything in one place."
