When we visited Calgary in the fall of 2010 the Burton’s cat Louie had just gone missing. We put up posters and searched the neighbourhood hoping we would be able to find him. In the middle of December that year, long after everyone except Madison had given up hope, a call came that Louie had been found. Where you might ask? In a town about 200 miles from Calgary. How he got there remains a mystery.

One of the first Blocks of the Month for the 2010-2011 Guild season was a pinwheel cat. Because Louie was still missing I decided to make something for Madison using a cat theme. When I finished the pinwheel cat block, it wasn’t quite “cat” enough for me. I found a book of paper-pieced cats (and dogs) in the Guild library and did a couple of samples. They were very hard, but I had a paper-piecing course coming up and knew I’d gain some of the skills I needed. I struggled to complete the eight cats I had chosen from the book, and I think I made each cat at least twice.

But eight cats are hardly big enough for a quilt. I looked online and found the Fashion Cats, also paper pieced but on a larger scale. I had such fun picking out fabrics to dress the cats in.

The quilt was taking shape, but I still didn’t have a design in mind. At the Guild year-end potluck a woman who had seen me working on the cats suggested they would make a nice border. That was all I needed and I could immediately see the design for the quilt.

The Sunflower Cat was another of the Blocks of the Month. This was a machine appliqué block and, since the practice piece worked well, I created three Sunflower Cats for the center. The last pieces I needed were corner cats and I found those online as well.

I realized after I had all the blocks completed that they were a combination of 6” and 12” blocks. In order to tie them all together I added 8” border blocks that were made up of small pieces of the fabrics I used in making all the cats.

The final piece was finding the right background, backing and binding material. I was able to find a star motif printed on both a black and a white background.

This was my first full-sized quilt and both Madison and Louie were happy with it.