Happiness is...

...making a quilt for the expected granddaughter!

I grew up doing handwork, whether it be embroidery dish towels for my mother (the ultimate busy work until I embroidered to the knee of my red corduroy pants and instead of removing the stitches, I removed the knee--I was five, okay?), or crocheting oven pads or knitting an afghan, only to decide to start over when I was finished. Then I'd rip out and reroll the yarn, which explains why so few pieces of my handiwork survived.

I moved up to crewel and needlepoint and had a brief time with counted cross-stitch, but I found that too laborious. Plus, then, I had a toddler and a crawler and one cannot really count stitch cloth and stop a disaster in the making at the same time. I even hooked rugs.

I graduated to quilts: baby ones for my friends and then large ones for our beds. I made quilts of ties and embroidered them a la Victorian piecework.

Then I quit. For no real reason I can fathom, but I stopped.

Until the baby.

When my first son was on his way, we had a dog. I found a simple pattern for a puppy quilt and did a blanket-stitch applique. The quilt survived him, but has definitely seen better days. I stored it in the cedar chest.

Now with the advent of his daughter nearing, I needed to continue the tradition. They have cats and so the decision was simple: a kitty quilt. I searched the Internet for a pattern in the same vein as his and found one. It was even showcased in browns and oranges; poor kitty looked like a '70s throwback. I redid her in pink, yellow and green gingham--her mother's choice of nursery--and voila! in a little over a month I had the joy of handwork all over again.

To make it even better, the store where I bought the fabric, Happiness Is Quilting, in McKinney, TX, is showing it and the original on its site. Just scroll down to Kay's Calico Cats.

Only problem is, now I need another project.