FLORIBUNDA! TOWANDA!

A post from Kelli–

Let me introduce you to someone who means a lot to me!  This girl has been a staple in my life for atleast 10 years.  We have this strange relationship where we might not talk for a few months at a time, but are able to pick up right where we left off.  Other times, you can’t rip us away from the phone and we talk every day.  Sometimes it’s a few messages here and there and sometimes phone calls for hours.  Whatever way though, I’ll take it because she is one of a kind.

I met her way back in the day when I was working at a restraunt not to far away in Spillville called The Old World Inn.  It was a neat restaurant that was located in a building that previously had bootlegging tunnels built into it during the Prohibition.  The building isn’t too far from the river and rumor had it that they would run booze on the river and then being it in through the tunnels.  While working there as a server, one of my co-workers told me that I reminded her of her best friend from home.  She would tell me about this friend of hers and it did seem like were oddly quite similar.  We both liked to drink a little and get in a bit of trouble, but we were both very hard-working.  We both came from strong farm families.  I just kind of shrugged it off, but one night we ended up going out to a local bar and I met up with Katie and her friend Megan (Ferg or Fergie) that she wanted me to meet.  And the rest is history!  We just clicked and were besties from that point forward!

Throughout the years, we have been there for each other through break-ups, make-ups, weddings, a mid-life crisis or two (usually alcohol induced), many moves, new jobs, depression troubles, school, and pretty much everything that life throws to a person in their 20’s.  Throughout it all though, she’s been there.  She’s gotten to know my family on a personal level.  We don’t have to explain family dynamics because the other is already aware.  She knew Jason’s family even before I did as she was friends with his brother before either of us knew that Jason existed.  She comes from a strong farm family, so we are able to relate to the struggles that family farms face on a daily basis.  Often times she knows what I’m going to say before I even know I’m going to say it.  And the best part?  Her favorite movie is Fried Green Tomatoes–Which happens to be mine too!

A while back, I decided that I was going to make her a quilt.  I just didn’t know which quilt because I knew it had to be something special.  One day, mom mentioned that she had a basket of floral fabrics and was planning to make Floribunda–A Bonnie Hunter pattern with this box of old ugly florals she had been collecting.  At that moment, I knew what quilt I was going to make her–FLORIBUNDA!

If you haven’t seen the movie Fried Green Tomatoes, I highly recommend you stop what you are doing this minute and find it–Somehow, but find it!  The basis of the movie is that there is a woman who goes to a nursing home to visit a husband’s relative.  It turns out the husband’s relative hates her and throws things at her, so to be supportive of her husband, she continues to go, but she just goes to a common area to wait for him while he visits.  She ends up meeting a lady named Ninny Threadgoode who tells her a story about a girl named Idgie and her best friend Ruth.  That’s all I can really say, but the movie goes on to show the relationship that Evelyn (the supportive wife) and Ninny develop.  It ends up turning out that Evelyn begins to look forward to visits to the nursing home and starts to make her own visits just to see Ninny.  One of the saddest scenes is when Evelyn goes to see Ninny and finds a nurse in the room tearing down decoupaged flowers that Ninny had on her walls.  She tells Evelyn that Ninny has gone home–Again, all I can say without ruining it, but I’ve taken that as my inspiration and am making this Floribunda quilt for my flower sister-my Idgie–Fergie!

I’ve been working on this a bit, but haven’t quite finished it.

At first, I was kind of sad that I wasn’t going to have an ugly floral print quilt for myself, however after a bit of thinking and a suggestion from my wonderful Momma, I decided to make String Spiderwebs (another Bonnie Hunter pattern) with the leftovers and a lovely batik that I found.  I’m still working on this one too–I’ve got all the blocks made, but I’m working on getting the papers ripped off and then I’ll be making blocks and have it done in no time.

My goal is to get my taxes finished up this weekend and then get some sewing time in.  With the farm taxes taking a lot of extra work, we end up having to file our personal taxes a bit late, so I’m hoping to get them wrapped up this weekend.  But after that?  I’m going to be a sewing machine!