Another Baby Quilt

Out neighborhood is a nice enough one. I sincerely believe that if anyone had any real trouble, any of the neighbors  -- except the Nonspeakers -- would help out. But it isn't the kind of neighborhood where we are in and out of each others' houses. We don't get together for coffee. I have a key to Andrea's house and she has a key to mine; we take in mail for each other, that kind of thing. When we moved in, back in 1999, there were so few children that we didn't even turn on our light for Trick or Treat. Over the years, though, this has changed. Some young couples have moved in; down at the far end of the street is a family with three elementary school boys and across from them is another with three elementary school girls and a toddler boy. There are other young couples with even younger children. Across the street, next to the Nonspeakers, there's the cutest young woman; she's an English teacher and her husband is in the Navy. For one long stretch, he was in Afghanistan (or perhaps Iraq, I'm not totally sure) and the rest of us kind of kept an extra eye out. He's back and I believe is on his last tour of duty before leaving the military. They have produced two cute little girls and just before the weather got cold I saw her outside and she had a familiar look about her. "Have you got something going on there?" I asked and she replied, "Yes, another girl, due in February."

I kind of forgot about that and a couple of weeks ago when we had some unseasonable warm weather I saw her out front with a bundle in her arms. That third girl had arrived. I mentioned this to Himself who promptly suggested I needed to make a quilt for her. Mindful that third children don't get much recognition upon arrival, I pulled out the scraps from the Tula in solids quilt that I'd made for my coworker and made sixteen free pieced blocks. Before long I had a flimsy and since it is such a small quilt, I machine quilted it myself.