A Cautionary Tale

Gather around, ye gentle quilters, and heed my cautionary tale. I have great hopes that none shall ever experience this nefarious deed by giving ear to me now.

I spent a year of my quilting life working on the Farmer's Wife Quilt with a group of women. We were making two blocks a week. Not only that there are 111 blocks. It was a formidable, arduous, Herculean one-year project.  These very difficult six-inch blocks, some having 50-74 pieces, took every bit of the two weeks for me to make. But wait, I also paper-pieced them. All those itty-bitty pieces. (If you've made a Dear Jane quilt, I apologize for whining. But, I mean, who would ever be crazy brave enough to make a gazillion four-inch blocks?)

When I had made sweated over half a gazillion blocks, okay--somewhere around 35--I put them up on my design wall to gaze at their glory. And to provide me incentive to soldier on.

Here is where the tale takes a mournful turn. I left the blocks on the design wall. Every day I would pass by the design wall and bask in the glory of six-months work.

One afternoon, as I walked into my house from a grueling day at work, I spied something horrific on the floor.

Horror of horrors, hubby's horrid cat had chewed off the corners of two of my blocks! In fairness I should attest that we had two cats in the house. One was mine, Newt, who never, ever chew on his beloved mistress' quilt blocks. It could only be the evil Cleo, my hubby's cat.

You can see the evil in her eyes.

I should have seen it coming.

 Avert your eyes if you are of the sensitive nature. Behold the destruction!

I think I'm going to extract every tooth out of her mouth.

After that, I'm not giving her any dentures either!

She'll just have to gum her food for the rest of her life!

I immediately called hubby at work and told him that he was lucky his cat was still alive!

I then concocted a suitable welcome home for my hubby. I found two cat stuffies and hung 'em high on the front porch. Then I made some crosses and little graves and put them in the backyard.

Then I drug that horrid little feline out and showed her the fate of those who eat my quilt blocks. She pretended to be cool, you know how cats are. But she's never touched another block of mine again!

I put on the funeral dirge and waited for hubby to come home.

And here's how focused my hubby is...he walked right in and didn't even see the cats! But I made sure he did. Oh yes, I made sure he did! Those atrocious (stuffed) cats suffered a fitting death!

Shhh! It's secret!

I guess I should say "Shhh! Oh darn. It's no longer a secret!"

My Talented Geek Son (TGS) and his Oh-So-Lovely Wife (OSLW) have already found out that I making them a Double Wedding Ring. It's OSLW's favorite quilt. How could I not make it for her? I love her dearly. Of course, DWR is a difficult quilt and sometimes I shudder thinking of it. OSLW wanted the colors to be like a fire: red, yellow, orange and blue. Lots of blue. She's seen audition of fabric colors. She probably didn't recognize the fabrics as batik. I thought it was the best bet for fire. And, as of yesterday, they saw the background fabric. Here's a sneak peek. I still need more blue:

Most of the Fabrics for DWR

The darkest blue will be the cornerstones. One of the blues there got discarded because it had some purple in it. I still think it's going to be beautiful. I'm going to make a couple of rings and let her see to make sure she likes it in quilt form.

My first daughter may know there's a quilt coming for her. I mentioned a couple of posts back that I was going to make her quilt as a leader/ender with the DWR. Of course, she has no idea what that means. It can stay that way for awhile.

I haven't gotten a "Name Alias" for her yet. I've switched it three times already! She has a dozen nicknames. It's quite a record. I'm just nervous about their privacy on the web. It's a big place and I'm not comfortable enough to call them by their given names.

I should ask my TGS. He knows all about Net Security. It's part of his job. In fact, he scares me to death with stories of what people can do to steal your identity and how far they can go to practically make you disappear from cyberspace. Among his credentials is one of his college classes was Ethical Hacking! Basically learning everything about hacking (fight fire with fire) but only for defense.

But I Digress. That's probably the phrase they'll put on my gravestone...

The Happy News is I just finished cutting all the sets for the main blocks, which are churn dashes. Now, you know and I know what that block is, but this will still keep some of the surprise until a few inches down!


I've shown my daughter the fabrics when she was here once. I saw them and thought they were perfect for her. They are Japanese Taupe Daiwabo Fabrics. I love this type of fabric so much and #1 better be careful. This quilt may do a disappearing act also! Not into cyberspace, but into a Secret Hiding Place in my home. Shhh!

A preview of the fantastic fabric in the block sets.

But I Digress. There are 72 sets of blocks. The dark is two 3" squares and four 2.5" squares. The light fabric is two 3" squares and one 2.5" square. Those of us who can do quilt math can tell this is going to be a six inch block. Oh oh. That's the first time I put it through my math brain. Ouch!!! Say it's not so. Six inches--arggghhhh. I'm 90% through making the Farmer's Wife quilt, which is 111 or close to that, Six Inch Blocks. I only made it through by paper-piecing.

Breathe.

Big Breath.

Sit down.

Put your head between your knees.

Okay. You can do it. This block only has 4 HSTs in it. (The pulse is coming down). That's child's play next to some of the FW that had 50-75 pieces in them. (Pulse going up.) I kid you not! I sadistically counted the pieces for the blocks. It's amazing I even went through with it.

Oh dear, you're beginning to get enough information to think I'm foolhardy. I'm using that nice word. Some would just drop the "hardy" part of the word.

But I Disgress. The quilt is going to be absolutely gorgee-oh-sus. Here's a looksie.

I'm going to go lay down now. I'm still feeling a little faint....