I love how the change of seasons forces me to dust my home whilst reconsidering my decorating choices. Without the holiday prompts, I’m not sure that there would ever be any deep cleaning in my home, because, well, I suffered deep childhood trauma around dusting.

You see, when we were growing up on the farm, we had to get up and milk cows every Saturday morning just like every other day. Then instead of going to school, we had to perform a thorough house cleaning, which was orchestrated and institutionalized by our mother. Mom (who’s reading this — “Hi Mom!”) had apparently been a drill sergeant in a past life. Here was a typical Saturday schedule:

• 5:50 a.m. – wake up
• 6 a.m.- be dressed, in the barn, and preferably smiling while milking cows
• 7:15 – breakfast, breakfast clean-up, and napping
• 8 a.m. – back to the barn to feed the cows and for barn cleaning chores
• 10 a.m. – get a dust rag and polish and clean everything in sight (kitchen dining table legs, end tables, heat registers, woodwork, kitchen cabinets, bedside tables, desks, etc. etc.) After the dust rag was filled, clean the bathroom. After the dusting and bathroom cleaning, vacuum the carpets, then mop the floors. Meanwhile, we’d strip all the beds and do laundry.
• Noon – lunch and then more farm work or some fun activity, but always keeping an eye on the clock because by 4 p.m. we had to be thinking about going back to the barn for the evening milking.

I hated Saturdays. I would much rather have milk three barns full of cows than clean one bathroom or polish one chair. I’m weird like that.

Nowadays, except for the cow milking, I know at least one of my sisters still performs this Saturday ritual. She says cleaning calms her during difficult times. I did not get this weird gene mutation.

But I digress. This is a quilting blog, not an airing of childhood grievances blog (However, I would like to remind everyone that Cindy is in fact my mother’s favorite. Oops. If you’re still reading, mom, I didn’t mean to spill your secret!)

Finally, the quilting part of this blog.

I’ve had a little winter tree paper piecing pattern rattling around in my head for about a year. This week it came to life. I received a tiny pillow form this summer and it is the perfect pillow accent for my entry hall chair when I change the decor from fall to winter.

I’m working on some pattern tweaks. I’ll share it next week.

Happy dusting!