Royal Cats

Are you sick of cats yet?  Because I'm not!  I've been watching a sampler for a little over a week on eBay.  The seller had it up for a Buy It Now of $650, which I felt was a little much ... some bugs made a meal out of part of the upper alphabet long ago and made dessert out of a few other places.

BUT, the cool thing about this sampler is there are two amazing cats at the bottom of the sampler sitting on green cushions with CROWNS floating above their heads.  They are patchwork style cats, I'm assuming to look like Calico cats.  ROYAL cats!  They're all fat and happy on their pillows.

It was stitched in 1939 by a ten-year-old named Mary on what must be VERY fine linen (it's only 12 inches across.  When I'm trying to gauge count on a photograph, I picture something like a sheet of paper (which is 11 inches long) laying across the bottom.  There are a lot of stitches in those 12 inches.  Sellers of antique samplers are often not too concerned about the exact stitch count of a piece, although some will count it out for me if I ask.)

Anyhoo, I asked the seller to send me a better picture -- seriously, this picture was the best one he had up.  He had lots of pictures of the damage to the frame, but I couldn't even read the verse or the girl's name (I think it might be Mary Ann Buroughs.)  He never sent me a picture, so I made him an offer of about half, thinking...what the heck.

Anyhoo, again, I was just talking to my friend Kathy up in Milwaukee and wanted her to go look at this silly cats sampler on eBay (because she's a crazy cat lady, too.)  And oh no, the listing had ended.

Because the seller accepted my offer!

The sampler's got dogs, and birds, and butterflies, and the verse is a fairly familiar one about making Jesus your friend (which I like.)  I'll be excited to add another sampler to my brood, and that this one has cats is MWAH (meow?) ... icing on the cake.  What do you think of it?

Tonight I'm sitting here charting my Ragamuffin #2 -- that lovely Quaker.  The more I chart it, the more I love it.  The motifs are gorgeous, and I am realizing what draws so many to the Quaker style -- it's simple in a lot of ways, and very earthy and natural (with recognizable flowers and greenery), and the color palette is very pleasing.  This one only has about ten colors in it all-told, and I know it will be a lot of fun to stitch.

Before I leave, I'll tell you that my Easter kittens are doing great -- Peep, Bunny and Jelly Bean have all opened their eyes, and Peter is lagging a little (he's the smallest now.)  Jelly Bean is starting to walk with her belly held up off the floor, and Bunny is getting (sorry, Bunny!) fat.

We ended up naming the momma cat "Isabelle" after Joan of Arc's mother.  I liked the idea of naming her after someone young and brave (she is only seven months old or so, and under seven pounds.)  But she just didn't seem like a Joan to me.  She's doing a great job with her babies -- I'm so proud of her.