My dad, Don, celebrated his 60th 4 days before Cole and Imogen turned 5 (he still gives me grief that I wasn't organised enough to deliver his grandbabies on his birthday!)
To commemorate, I made him a new quilt. (I don't have any pictures of the original quilt I made for dad a decade+ ago...Dad, can I tempt you into playing photographer?)
Well, I've mentioned before that I'm a bit of a last-minute Lucy, right? I was really impressed with myself when I had this quilt finished - label and all! - a full month in advance of dad's birthday. (Those sounds you're hearing would be the Angels of Timeliness falling over dead from the shock)
Of course, me being me, I still hadn't wrapped it the morning of dad's party...which may not have been the most brilliant move in hindsight. As I grabbed it off the back of the couch to wrap (we'd just moved out of our home in Rotorua 2 days before and I'd left the quilt on the sofa in the new place to air. And because I liked looking at it!) I discovered that a certain little someone had added a series of drawn hearts right in the centre of the quilt. In felt pen. Hot pink fluoro felt pen. Cue completely inappropriate language and a bit of a *chat* with said little someone. Little toad. Even though she knows (hot pink + hearts - I'm sure you can figure out the culprit) so very well about pens only being for paper, apparently she felt the need to further embellish the quilt when she realised it was for Granddad Don. *I wanted him to know he's my giant love heart!*
...did I mention this was a whopping 25 minutes before we needed to leave for the party, so there was absolutely no time to even try and get the markings off and then dry the quilt...we just had to run with it.
So I wrapped it up and later in the day, when dad opened his present, I quietly mentioned to him about the marking and how it should wash out. I hoped. And you know those moments when you realise just how lucky you are to be related to someone? This was one - dad laughed, told me it was so fabulous, and then went over and genuinely thanked Immy for making him feel special by adding her artwork to his quilt. You should have seen her shine!*
There's a reason we all adore this guy.
And then a few weeks ago, I asked dad if the hearts had washed out properly after all, and he was horrified at the very suggestion he would try it - he wanted to keep them there for all to see! So now I've given him instructions on (hopefully) heat setting the marker pen, and I guess I can officially count that as my first collaborative quilt with my daughter!
*We had a little chat later on, her and I, about how drawing on someone else's stuff is never okay, but that if she did want to add something to a present someone else had made for a special someone, she should talk to me about it and we would definitely work out a plan. (Phew - really wanted to nip any suggestions drawing all over quilts was okay in the bud. EEK - can you imagine?!?)
Comments