Working on the embroidery now, doing all the "A" color on the chart, described as a medium rose. I selected the skeins that came as close to that as I could, pulling them out of the plastic bag Betty had stored them in. I've worked all the rose outline stitches in the irises on the border of the quilt, and have two more of the big ones in the middle of the quilt before I move on to the light and medium yellow threads.

The stitching takes me back to Mrs. Oswald's seventh grade art class. We sat at long tables with cloth stretched on metal hoops, laboriously trying to master outline and satin stitching, lazy daisy and French knots. I still have a set of napkins and placemats I completed. I also remember trying to do a small medieval-style tapestry that fell by the wayside after a few days, never to know a needle's touch again.

The quilt is a little awkward to work on, and I use a 14-inch wooden hoop. That size seems to be the best to handle as I shift the cloth around. Yesterday I stitched to the sounds of Celtic Woman and classical music. It doesn't seem right to listen to pop music for some reason.

We are trying to get things other than cloth flowers to bloom, too. Betty loves the old apple tree at the farm, and Jim cut three branches from it and brought them to our house. My friend Doug Oster, photographer and gardener extraordinaire, advised us to pound the ends of the branches with a hammer, immerse the stems in water, place them in a spot where the temperature is about 50 degrees, and wait. I'm adding prayer and a little reiki to the mix.

As I embroider to enhance the flower petals of the quilt, I look up and around the room at the plants to give my eyes a little rest. I think about the remark Betty made when she visited us several weeks ago, that I must have a green thumb because the pothos and ferns grew so well.

My dad was the real gardener in the family, and my mother took care of the peonies and magic lilies and houseplants. I'm just keeping up what they started. And now the flowers that bloom in this January weather are the appliqued ones under my needle as I work rose colored thread along petal after petal on the cloth.

Sometimes I wish the quilt flowers were like the magic lilies my mother planted near the back door. Lush greens flourish in the spring and early summer, then shrivel away to nothing. And then, like their name implies, they spring up in August, lovely pink-toned blossoms nodding on their long stems.