Storytorch

Central Pennsylvania could not be more lovely on a mid May day. As I write this late afternoon I hear, periodically, the clip-clopping of a horse's hooves outside, and I lift the lace window curtains to see an Amish buggy pass by on the street below.

My audiences yesterday near Mifflinburg and today in Ephrata were attentive and kind as they listened to me recount the many reasons why we quilt. They paid attention as I shared images of both spectacular and ordinary quilts from museums all over the US.

I prepared a half-sheet of paper (pink) printed on one side with Web sites of further interest (Quilts of Valor, My Brother's Keeper, Quiltology, the Quilter's Hall of Fame) and on the reverse with the words to my little ditty, "I Gotta Quilt." Sadly, the sheets for Ephrata were left behind in Mifflinburg, and so, as promised, I share them here.

International Quilt Study Center, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, www.quiltstudy.org To help me reach my membership goal by becoming a member, go to www.quiltstudy.org and scroll down on the bottom left side of the home page to "Marianne Sent Me."
Quilts of Valor Foundation, www.qovf.org
My Brother’s Keeper, www.thesleepingbagproject.org
Museum of the American Quilters Society, Paducah, Kentucky, www.quiltmuseum.org
Quilter’s Hall of Fame, Marion, Indiana www.quiltershalloffame.net
Quiltology, Chicago, Illinois, www.quiltology.com
Madison County Iowa, www.madisoncounty.com
Fons & Porter, Winterset, Iowa, www.fonsandporter.com

I Gotta Sew!
(Original lyrics by Carol Leigh, from “Peter Pan” respectfully revised by Marianne Fons)

I gotta sew!
At my machine I can dream I’m the queen of the biggest quilt show!
I applique my way right to the stage of Quilt World Tokyo!
I gotta sew!

I gotta quilt! I cut and stitch, and I simply can’t quit, it’s the way I was built.
When one is done I start in on another. it gives me a lilt.
I gotta quilt!

If I had a bobbin with no stoppin’, I’d be in cream!
I’d stitch quite a while, on a perfect seam long as a mile.

So, naturally, when a design that occurs in my mind is appealing to me,
How can I ditch it, I just have to stitch it, it calls to me so,
That I’ve gotta let go, and sew!

Today's Fortune Cookie Fortune
You will hear an amusing song.