The dragon quilt is to illustrate a story I wrote for my son Joshua who was, at the time I wrote it, almost 4. We were about to move from Washington, DC, to a new home in Friday Harbor, Washington. Since then, we have moved away from Friday Harbor, to Camden, Maine. The story is set on San Juan Island, Wash., and in the area where we built our house, Hannah Heights. It has some of his favorite things like music, and trains, and waffles, and the Puff the Magic Dragon song.

Begin the full text of :
Joshua Meets Puff, A Tale of Hannah Lee
By Sarah Ann Smith, October 1997

Once upon a time, not far into the future, a boy named Joshua sailed to a magical island called San Juan. Joshua had arrived in a lovely town where every day was Friday, so it was called Friday Harbor.

On the trip across the island, Joshua could see beautiful snow-capped peaks and passed a farmer tilling his fields. Nearby, he saw a well and next to it a picnic basket and mandolin (which is sort of like a guitar and plays wonderful music). But most wondrous of all was the little bearded man in the red hat who stopped to talk to Joshua. Joshua didn’t know it then, but the little gnome (for that is what the man was) had magical powers.

The little bearded man told Joshua he was about to embark on a journey and offered him the jug, to fill with water at the well, the picnic basket, and the mandolin to learn how to play. Joshua thanked the little gnome for being so kind, and went along his way.

Joshua had been walking for a long time, so he decided to stop by a babbling brook for a snack and a nap. He didn’t know that while he was asleep the little woodland creatures crept out to look after him and make sure he was safe! The young lad hadn’t realized how tired he was! When he awoke, the stars were out and shining brightly.

Joshua was a little afraid to be out at night in a place he didn’t know, so he began walking. Before long, he came to a clearing with a barn, stable and house. As he neared the house, a young woman came out holding a lantern. Joshua was surprised that she seemed to have heard him. He said “Hello,” and she replied “I am Sylvine; I heard your mandolin calling to me. Please stay here where there is shelter, and I will see you on your way in the morning.”

Joshua gladly answered “thank you, I would love to stay here, for I am very sleepy.” They went into the house, where the nice spotted doggy, who was named Spot, wagged his tail and barked a happy hello to Joshua and the girl.

Sylvine hung the lantern on the wall and offered Joshua supper of fresh bread with butter and jelly, tea and cream and fruit. Soon it was time for bed, and they went to sleep. The dog slept on the rug, and the cat in front of the fireplace.

Soon, it was morning and they had waffles for breakfast. Then, it was time for Joshua to journey on. Sylvine gave Joshua a knapsack to carry his things, and he thanked her for the gift and her hospitality.

As the sun rose in the sky, Joshua moved westward. Before long, Joshua arrived at the water’s edge, in a land called Hannah Lee.

As Joshua sat by the sea, a friendly whale named Hannah came by and said hello to him, and told him that he would receive a special visit from a magical friend, Puff. Now Joshua had no idea who or what a Puff was, but since the whale was so nice and friendly, Joshua decided to sit down and have a morning snack. He ate his bread and some fruit and had a few drinks of water from the jug.

Then he noticed the most curious thing: the jug filled back up all by itself, magically! What a wonderful gift from the gnome! Then Joshua took out his mandolin and began to learn how to play it. As he strummed, a dragon swam towards the shore.

Neither Joshua nor the dragon (which looked like a sea serpent when it was swimming) knew whether to be more scared or curious. In the end, they both decided to be curious and check each other out.

As the baby dragon got out of the water, his fins turned green! Not many people know that dragons, like chameleons, can change colors. When they are happy, they turn pink and purple. When they are a bit scared, they turn green, and when they are sad turn blue or gray. And when they are just swimming along, they can be any combination of colors—just like Puff looked (blue and red) when Joshua first saw him.

Well, the baby dragon swam right up to the edge of the beach toward this funny thing he saw, even though he didn’t know it was a boy. It had blond furry stuff on its head, walked on only two legs, and had no wings! It was Joshua.

The boy said, “Hi. My name is Joshua.”

And the baby dragon, now happy and pink, said “Hi! I’m Puff and I’m a dragon. Will you be my friend?” And with that, Puff walked onto the grass and sat down next to Joshua. Joshua asked Puff if he would like some fruit and water, and Puff said, “Yes, thank you, I’m hungry.”

Then Puff noticed the mandolin, and asked Joshua to play him a song, and he did. It was a song about a train called “She’ll be comin’ round the mountain.” When Joshua was done, Puff asked if he could play the mandolin.

And Puff taught Joshua a sea chanty, then said he would make up a new song about his friend, Joshua. It went like this:

Puff the Magic Dragon

(insert the rest of the lyrics here…since they are copyrighted, I won’t! just substitute “Joshua Smith” for “Johnny Paper”.)

Joshua and Puff became the best of friends, and played by the shore and went on sailing trips together. Joshua sailed in his ship and Puff swam along side, and they had great adventures. But those are new stories, and this is THE END.

….well….nearly! I still have to hand sew down the back of the binding (mulled over doing it by machine, but want top notch work, so will hand sew), sew on the sleeve, and make and add the label. Will also need to quilt the critters I added at the last moment, but that will be fairly easy!
YEAH! So here it is:

As you can see, I decided on the wavy inner border, and had thought of using facings. BUT, I also tried something just to see …when I sewed on the facings (straight grain) instead of turning them to the back I wrapped them, and liked the combination of both binding and inner border, except for the dark brown in the center bottom. So, I un-sewed the center and spliced in some of the mottled batik I think of as “lichen on rocks.” Now it looks better.

Here’s a close-up of the finished boy and dragon

–today I beefed up the “fringes” –that aqua eyebrow thingy made with Madeira Jewel FX (black core) thread… in this case a teal/black metallic thread.

I really like how the clouds turned out. Thanks to Dubiquilts and Betty and the Frayed Edges and everyone who commented for their suggestions…the quilt is better because of you! I kept the fire after all, and added clouds (except in thread, and now have a new technique with the clouds that I love…look at the tree pics below) and added critters that give you a little extra treat for coming up and looking closely.

and here’s one of the foxes and a better picture of the clouds….

Caroline asked a question about how I did the trees, so I’ll post that reply tomorrow! Now, for some sofa R&R! Nope..hang on…change that. Tomorrow I’ll upload the story on which I based this quilt…it is a story I wrote for my oldest son when we were getting ready for a cross-country move. Then I’ll post the answers to Caroline’s question on Wednesday. OK?

Today was better. Got the remaining rocks, shrubs and all the trees quilted. Betty, one of the local quilters here (in / near Camden), has a wonderful artistic eye, and she suggested I might add a mythical critter in the foreground if there was one in the story. Well, didn’t have any of those either in the story or in my fabric stash (or time to make one), but I DID have a print with some foxes and a bunny and squirrel that were close to the correct scale. And since the story is set where we used to live, with birds and foxes and bunnies running amok, I added two fox, two small birds, a bunny, a cat and a squirrel (none of the latter on the island, but I liked him anyway!).

The critters will get quilted later…now I’m trying to decide which way to border the quilt. Of course, by the time you read this it will be done, but here’s the three alternatives. Stay tuned to see what I decide between the time I write this and the time I upload it for viewing. The first option is, esentially, nothing…just add a facing to clean finish the edges:

The second option is an inner border (here pinned, but would be fused and stitched):

The third option is binding. Instead of cut more strips I just moved the wobbly inner border bits to the edge. In the photo this option looks pretty good, but in real life it looks wimpy.

The only quilting left besides the critters is the sky, I know what I want to do, and it will be easy…just need a couple hours in the morning. BUT, then I must do the facings or whatever for the edges, and decide about the inner border.

Almost there! Will have some “hidden” finishing up to do this coming week (sew down the facing, add the hanging sleeve and label), but by golly, I’m almost there!

PS–Sunday evening addendum: I’ve done it! Well, not the hand work and such, but pretty much done! Will have pics tomorrow…YEAH! Now I can have a life again!!!!

Can you say BORING? Today I quilted the rocks and cave entrance on the right,

the grasses (golden fabric with gray grass, a batik), and the ground (the creamy scroll).

Oh, and the backpack, mandolin and jug.

From a distance, you can’t tell I’ve done a thing despite a long day at the machine. Oh well.

Tomorrow, the shrubs and rocks in the two bottom corners, the trees and (saving as a treat) the sky, since I’ve decided to quilt in clouds and am looking forward to that. Then, the inner border, facing, hanging sleeve and label. Suuuurrrrrrrre! By Sunday. Yeah…um……

Woohoo….today I finished the top… thanks to Dubiquilts’ comment, decided to leave the fire, but also included a jug, backpack and mandolin (from the story). Then, I added the backing and (drum roll please, began quilting!). The photo above is before quilting began. I set the quilt on the machine cabinet, and of course when I returned Thumper was asleep right in the middle!

I guess that means it has the cat-seal-of-approval…..

Today I got the hardest things done: the boy,

and the dragon,

Here’s a close-up of his face:

I was going to do small circles on the face and legs, like on a lizard, but decided just some contour lines was better.

The fire, flames only, was easy. Tomorrow I’ll start with the mandolin, backpack and jug, and then it will be fast going for the trees, rocks, cave entrance, shrubs, earth, sky etc….I think I might actually get this done before midnight Sunday! Better remember to remove the chalk dust from marking the scales and contour lines though…I can still see some blue dust in this last photo. The eyes, by the way, are angelina, outlined with thread.