Doh!

1) I wish I had written this book. I mean, really - with my social conscience and my quilting history, it's a tragedy someone else had this excellent idea. But good for her, and I highly recommend it.

2) Have you ever had a project...well, just not come out right? I had all this purple fabric, and I sewed it together, thinking it might make a nice birthday surprise for a certain niece of mine. It's not what I had imagined, although to be fair it still needs an outside border:

For some reason, I have the voice of Tim Gunn in my head saying, "What a hot mess".

The pattern is "Tossed Nine Patch" by Eleanor Burns. I did not construct it using her method, though, because I had a bunch of 2.5" Bali Pop strips that I wanted to use (that were leftover from another project). This was a "use up the fabric stash" project, and so in that respect I'm happy about it. I will also say that I sewed a lot of this while listening to The Weepies, in particular the song "Twilight", and the colors here sort of look like twilight, don' t they?

We will not discuss the clumps of cat hair on certain spots of the quilt where the cat made himself comfortable. Wilbert the Cat came to be because my niece asked Santa to bring her a "real live purple kitty" for Christmas a few years ago, and he used to sleep on her bed. I think in some cat-knowing way he understood who this quilt was for, and felt he needed to contribute. All I'm saying is, thank all that is high and holy for dryers that suck up lint, fuzz, and kitty hair.

Edited to add -- it looks much better in daylight!!