After breakfast, the group was directed to the conference room that would be their classroom for the next ten days.
“Will your mother be able to find us?” Sarah asked as the women walked toward the classroom.
“I requested a room on the first floor close to the classroom. I’ll be able to go out the side door and right to our room to keep an eye on her. She sleeps quite a bit during the day; unfortunately, she’s up most of the night, so you girls might have to help keep me awake in class!” she added with a good-natured chuckle.
The conference room that was being used as their classroom was spacious, and each participant had a six-foot worktable. Two attractively dressed women, probably in their late fifties, were circulating around the room greeting the participants as they came in. After everyone was seated, the women introduced themselves as Brenda and Cheryl. They passed out name tags and markers and suggested that everyone put just their first names on the tags. “It’s much easier that way,” Cheryl said with a knowing smile and she received unanimous agreement from the group.
Brenda talked for a few minutes about the lodge and its amenities. She explained about meals and said that today’s breakfast was the only meal that would be served family style. She passed out menus and meal cards. “You check off what you want the next day for breakfast and lunch. Dinners will be buffet style. The times are printed on the menu.”
“What about lunch today?” one of the women asked.
“Oh, sorry. Lunch today will be served on the road.” Looking surprised, everyone looked around to see if they had missed something. “You look surprised!” Brenda said with a mischievous smile. “Well, this was a last-minute change in our schedule. We learned just yesterday that Mary Ellen McPherson will be doing a trunk show in Knoxville and we were able to arrange for a bus to take us. Now, I know many of you have been on the road, so you’re welcome to stay here and relax if you prefer, but it’s open to everyone and, of course, we’ve covered all the costs.”
“Do you know Mary Ellen McPherson?” Sarah asked Holly.
“I read an article about her in a quilting magazine. She does art quilts and they’re amazing. Not really my style, but she wins awards all over the country for her fabric art.”
“Are you going?” Sarah asked.
“I guess. It’ll be a rare experience since we don’t get celebrities in my small town. I’m tired though, and I’m tempted to stay here and just take a walk around the grounds.”
“I hate to pass up an opportunity like this,” Sarah responded thoughtfully, “but a relaxed afternoon in this serene setting really appeals to me too. I think I’ll stay behind. I wonder if we can get lunch here.”
Anticipating the question, Brenda said, “For those who stay behind, there’ll be a salad bar in the dining room.” She then added, “I’ve put a sign-up sheet on the front desk. Anyone who wants to go, please add your name. The bus will be here at 11:30 and you’ll be back here before dinnertime. Let’s take a quick break so anyone interested can sign up.”
Once everyone was again seated, Cheryl said, “Let’s get down to the really important stuff. Our retreat!” Everyone clapped encouraging her to continue. “We’ll be meeting here every day after breakfast and we’ll work all day unless we have an outside activity. After dinner, the room will be open until midnight. You’re welcome to come down and sew in your pajamas if you want.”
“Also,” Brenda spoke up from the sideline, “Cheryl and I are here for you. Don’t hesitate to come to either of us with questions, problems, … anything you need.
“What about outside activities?” a participant to Sarah’s left called out.
“Ah. We need to talk about that,” Cheryl responded. “Well, first of all there’s the trunk show this afternoon. Then the day after tomorrow we’ll spend the whole day out. We’re going to the Smoky Mountain Crafts Museum where you’ll see samples of many of the arts and crafts common to the area. They also have vendor spaces where artisans sell their own crafts. We’ve arranged to go on a day when most of the artists will be there so you can meet them and ask questions.”
“Do they have quilts there?” Jane asked.
“Lots of quilts! And a few special displays this month. We’ll have lunch in their cafeteria and leave there in the midafternoon. We’ll be driving from there through the Great Smoky Mountain National Park and stopping to view the area from Clingman’s Dome. From there …”
“Excuse me,” one of the younger quilters in the group said. “What’s Clingman’s Dome?”
“Sorry. I got ahead of myself. It’s an observation tower in the park. I’ve heard you can see for a hundred miles from the dome. When I was there, there was too much haze to see that far, but it was still spectacular. There are brochures on the table at the back of the room about the museum and Clingman’s Dome. Help yourself.”
“Okay, from there, we’ll stop for dinner in a local restaurant where you’ll get the best food you ever ate!”
“So, let me see. Brenda, what else is on our schedule?”
“Well, let’s see. There’s a trip into Gatlinburg for shopping. …”
“Fabric shopping?” someone asked and everyone laughed.
“Of course, fabric shopping,” she responded with a knowing grin. “And any other kind of shopping you’re interested in.” Turning to Brenda again, she asked, “What else do we have on the agenda?”
“Just the play,” Brenda responded.
“Yes,” Cheryl responded enthusiastically. “That’s on the sixth day of the retreat. A local high school is performing The American Quilt and it should be delightful. These kids have a talented drama department.”
After a few questions and some chatting between tables, Brenda announced, “Let’s get down to the nitty-gritty about our project.” She then talked about the photographs and requested that everyone bring their disks the next morning. “I’ll be giving them to the staff for printing while we begin making our quilt blocks. They’ll have them back to us the next morning.”
“What size will they be?” one of the students asked.
“They’ll be standard five-by-seven inches and we’ll add fabric strips to the sides to make them eight-and-a-half inches square. The photos and the pieced blocks will all be eight inches finished.”
“Will we be setting them the way they were in the pictures you sent us?” one of the students asked.
“Yes.” Brenda pulled three quilts out of her bag and Cheryl helped her clip them onto the display frames. “Come up and look closely if you’d like.”
The blocks were placed five across and seven down with eighteen pictures alternating with seventeen pieced blocks. Sarah studied the pieced blocks and was confused by the way they were done. Only one was done the way she intended to do hers with the same quilt block repeated for all of the pieced blocks. The second one was completed like a sampler, using the four that were included with the instructions plus thirteen other block designs that weren’t on the list. The third had the Churn Dash block, but instead of following the pattern, the Churn Dash was made smaller and placed on point with setting blocks in the corners to make it square. Sarah wondered if she had misunderstood the instructions, but then realized one of the three samples repeated the same block like she planned to do.
“I notice you have varied from the instruction sheet,” she started saying, when another woman spoke up as well saying, “… and these samples scare me! I don’t think I can do all that work in ten days.”
Cheryl was smiling and shaking her head. “I’m really sorry about this. The instructions we sent you are correct. You can change it if you want, but we’ll be instructing by the layout we sent you. All you’ll need to do is choose a quilt block and make seventeen of them. The confusion came when we asked a local quilt club to make three sample quilts for us and these are what we received,” she added looking toward Brenda to finish.
“They’re a very competitive group,” Brenda added laughing. “Very competitive, and they were tr
ying to outdo each other. But this is the layout we’ll be using,” she said, pointing to the first one. It had photo blocks alternating with only one of the blocks from the instruction sheet.
Cheryl continued saying, “Now, we know that we have a few very experienced quilters at this retreat, and you’re welcome to modify the pattern any way you want.”
“Is everyone clear on what we’re doing?” Brenda asked and the group nodded.
“Let’s stop here and get to know each other.” One by one, the students introduced themselves, talked a little about their experience, and displayed their fabric choices. Cheryl was right, Sarah thought. We have some very experienced quilters here!
* * * * *
A golden harvest moon was perched just behind the mountain range as Sarah sat on the porch to call Charles. It was hard to believe this same moon was shining on her house back home. She wanted to tell Charles about it, but found it indescribable. She used her cell phone to snap a picture, but was disappointed that it didn’t reveal the true beauty of the moment. She decided not to send it and just keep the memory in her heart.
“Hi, sweetie,” he answered. They talked awhile about their day. She told him about deciding to skip the field trip and just relax around the lodge. She’d wanted to follow a nature trail through the woods but realized she was still feeling a bit squeamish. She hadn’t told Charles about the previous night and decided not to mention it. Instead, she told him about her afternoon.
“I treated myself to a soak in the Jacuzzi. It’s out on the back porch and it was only about sixty degrees today. I thought I’d freeze, but when I stepped in the water it was very warm, steaming in fact, and it felt wonderful. I stayed out there in the sun and soaked until I was a prune!”
“… and you were wearing …?” he asked playfully.
“Charles! Shame on you,” she responded. “I brought my bathing suit.”
“What else did you do with your afternoon off?”
“I took a nap and, after that soak, it was a great nap.”
“I’m glad you had some relaxing time, sweetie.” Charles then told her he had purchased shelving and brackets for the garage, wanting to organize his tools and guy stuff, as Sarah called them. “I also got boards to put a rudimentary floor in the attic so I can put some of our storage up there.”
“Like what?” Sarah asked, wondering what they had that could be put away that inconveniently.
“Those boxes of mine in the garage mainly. I’m afraid to leave them out there another winter. They just might get damp and mildewed.”
“The boxes in the corner? What’s in those boxes?”
Charles hesitated a moment, but then said, “Just some case stuff I kept when I retired.”
“From the department?” she asked surprised that he had kept anything. “What are you going to do with them?”
“For now, I’m putting them in the attic.”
“No, I mean why did you keep them?”
Again, he hesitated. “There’re a few cases that I worked on that were never solved. They just stuck in my craw. I wanted to hang onto my notes and copies of some of the paperwork. You never know. …”
“Never know what?” Sarah asked, still wondering what this was all about.
“Okay. Sometimes one of the new guys will pick up a cold case and see if fresh eyes can see something the original guys missed. If that ever happens on these cases, I want to be involved. These cases meant more to me than most, you know?”
Sarah could hear the concern in his voice. “You’ll have to tell me about them when I get home.”
“I will. Now on to better stuff. Did you find out how they’ll be transferring your pictures to fabric?”
“Not yet. We won’t be talking about that until tomorrow, so I’ll know more then. How are the kids doing?”
Charles knew she was talking about their animals, Barney and Boots. “Well, Barney’s back home. Once the fans were removed and the house was back to normal, I went over and got him.”
“Was he happy to see you?”
“You bet, but he looked behind me and seemed disappointed that you weren’t there. Then when we got back to the house, he lumbered from room to room. I’m sure he was looking for you. I tried to explain, but he settled down as soon as Boots came down from the cabinet. I guess he felt he had to be brave for her benefit.”
They laughed about the pets when suddenly Charles said, “Oh, did Sophie call you?”
“No, not that I know of. Was she going to?”
“She called here this morning. She forgot to take your cell phone number. I figured she was going to call you.”
“Maybe I’ll give her a call tomorrow. Right now I only have a couple of bars so the signal is very weak.”
They continued to chat for a few minutes, neither really wanting to break the connection, but ultimately there was some interference on the line, and Sarah said she should hang up. Returning to her room, she sat down and thought about Charles and his cases, knowing he would never really be retired. He was a cop through and through.
As she was getting into bed, the phone rang. Since it wasn’t her cell phone, she assuming it was probably someone inside the hotel.
“Sarah, hi. It’s Ruth. How’s it going?”
“Ruth?” Sarah had to pause a second to get oriented, not expecting to hear from the owner of the quilt shop back home. “Are you okay?” she asked.
“I’m fine and I shouldn’t be bothering you, but I can’t possibly wait until you get home to find out about the project. I’m excited about the idea of offering a memory-quilt class at the shop and wanted to see if you still like the idea.”
Sarah laughed. “Well, first things first,” she said. “We haven’t started sewing yet but I’m beginning to think we can do this!” She went on to describe the sample quilts and the process.
“How do you get the pictures onto the fabric? I’ve heard that’s a long, drawn-out process.”
“Not anymore,” Sarah responded. “You can buy fabric in sheets all prepared and ready to go through an inkjet printer.”
“Wonderful! We can even do that for them,” Ruth exclaimed.
“Or, Anna’s husband can do it,” Sarah added. “You mustn’t forget you have a computer whiz in the family.” Anna was Ruth’s sister. She helped in the shop and processed the online orders that Ruth received through the website Anna’s husband set up for her.
“You’re right,” Ruth squealed with excitement. “I can’t wait to get started. This would be an excellent class to offer our customers. We’re all sick of sticking pictures into albums or losing them to the bottom of a box.”
“I agree. It’ll be a fun thing to do, but it could also be a very useful tool.”
“How so?” Ruth asked sounding curious.
“Well, one of the women brought her mother with her to the retreat. The mother is experiencing signs of dementia. Jane brought family pictures and is making the memory quilt for her mother as a way of helping her keep her memories fresh.”
“Interesting idea,” Ruth said, turning the concept over in her mind. After a short pause, she added, “It would be an excellent class for many reasons. I’m eager to talk about this when you get home.”
As they were saying good night, Ruth said, “Oh, I just remembered the time difference. I’ve kept you up. I’m sorry.”
“No problem, Ruth. I’m glad you called.”
Sarah pulled the covers up and glanced at the clock, remembering that breakfast was served promptly at 7:30. Yawning, she turned out the light. She had left the window shades up so she could see the moon shining through the trees. Somewhere off in the distance, she heard an animal howl and another respond.
Sarah smiled as she drifted off to sleep.
Sitting at her worktable the next morning, Sarah spread out her fabrics, eager to begin working on her quilt. She had chosen the Ohio Star block, thinking that it would complement her wedding pictures. Before coming to the retreat, Sarah had spent several hou
rs at the fabric store choosing her fabrics and had settled on a delicate fabric that featured soft white blossoms with touches of navy gracefully floating on a background of aqua and lavender. She decided to use this as her focus fabric for her outer border. For her Ohio Star block, she found a tone-on-tone lavender for the stars and a pale aqua for the star background. She chose a navy for the quilt’s inner border and decided to buy enough navy to outline her photographs as well.
“What are you thinking about so hard over there?” Jane asked, noticing that Sarah was studying her fabrics with a frown.
“I’m hoping my fabrics are right,” she responded beginning to look worried. “Maybe I should have a different background for my blocks.” She spread out her fabrics and told them her plan. “And I’m also wondering about this navy …”
“They’re beautiful,” Jane exclaimed.
“They are,” Holly chimed in. “Are these the colors of your wedding?”
“Actually, it was a very simple wedding, but my daughter wore aqua and my matron of honor wore lavender and I think these fabrics will complement the photographs nicely.”
“I think they’ll be perfect,” Jane’s mother spoke up surprising everyone. “And the Ohio Star is one of my favorite blocks. Did you know it was also called the Tippecanoe and Tyler Too block?”
Sarah looked surprised and said, “No. Why do you suppose?”
“Well,” Genevieve continued, “It was back during the 1840 presidential campaign. It was the slogan for William Harrison and John Tyler, and this quilt block was their symbol.”
“Fascinating,” Sarah responded glancing at Jane to see how she was responding to her mother’s sudden lucidity, but Jane was sorting her own fabrics at the time and didn’t seem at all surprised. Turning back to Genevieve, Sarah asked, “Do you know why they used that slogan?”
“It just so happens I do know,” she responded with a satisfied grin. “William Harrison was known for his victory against the Indians at the battle of Tippecanoe. That was in the early 1800s,” she added looking at Jane for clarification. “About 1814, don’t you think?” she asked her daughter.
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