"Borrowing" in a small world...

To welcome new life, a tradition exists in the northern part of China to make a Bai Jia Bei (100 good wishes quilt). Family and friends are invited to contribute a square of cloth along with a good wish for the baby. The squares of cloth are all sewn together into a quilt, and the good wishes are put into a scrapbook for the child. The quilt symbolizes wrapping the child in the good wishes of family and friends.

So my friend Denise is putting together a quilt for her future daughter from China. I love the idea.

I am not crafty. I don't think deeply about much. I don't have words of wisdom stored in my head to pull from at the right moment. I tend to live in the moment, dealing with only the immediate, handling only the necessities, and not really looking back or look forward (unless I am dreaming of retirement or vacation). My children will never have a quilt, a scrapbook, or a mom who can recall the dates of every milestone in their lives. I tried to keep track of C's school years in a cute little book and I stopped at kindergarten. They are lucky they have a blog. God made each have a birth or adoption story somewhat unique so that there is no way to forget some of the details (hurricane, unplanned home birth, baby acrobatics while trick or treating on Halloween, China).

I need to give Denise a square of fabric. Not too bad a task… I actually have that already. I picked out the fabric after searching an hour in the store for one that inspired me somehow, was related to China in some way, or had some deeper meaning. Well, she is getting a pretty piece of fabric.

Now comes the other part… a wish for Maggie Mae. Stress! To be put in a scrapbook where others will see it… more stress! Denise is a master scrap booker, as is our friend Rhonda who has posted on Denise's blog that she has come up with something creative. Yikes! I am thinking a simple "best wishes" in a handy green crayon on the back of an envelope just won't cut it. Certainly I can get some help from the web. I planned on doing that sometime in the coming month… did it unintentionally today…

I was looking at adoption and family blogs and happened across one about a 2 year old adopted from China and it was fun to read because it was written by her 16 year old sister. There are a zillion blogs on adoptions from China by the way of you are not into that genre. That zillion number is important to this story. Well, the sister wants to make a quilt for the 2 year old and count on a technologically savvy teenager to make a blog specifically showing a picture of every quilt square received so far, the wish attached, and the sender.

It was a dream! Certainly I could just "borrow" a wonderfully worded wish/quote and it would be meaningful because it would be the one of the 60+ listed that stood out to me. My work would be done! So I happily begin to scroll through the blog, seeing a few potentials but need to keep looking because the next one might be even better. Did I mention before there are a ZILLION blogs online??

And then, there it was, square #39… from Denise herself!

Guess it is a small world after all. Back to square (no pun intended) one!

Kate