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The Great Canadian Cuddle Quilt

 

 

The Great Canadian Cuddle Quilt

 

Dedicated to

Kwil’s Prairie Aunt Joan Rea,

Fynley H. and ALL Canadians

 

By Kalen Marquis

 

Kwil has stitched a little poem

Well...it's not so very small!

It patches provinces and territories

In a pattern of love for all!

 

You may not know about it--

Just ask frizzy-fuzzy, green-nosed Kwil!

His Prairie Aunt is

"The Great Canadian Quilter”

With sharps and notions never still!

 

A quintessential Canadian quilter!

Oh, how she loves to quilt!

She invented a quilting challenge:

The Great Canadian Cuddle Quilt!

 

It took many happy years!

She knew precisely what to do!

Quilting was her way to sparkle

Blocking, basting, binding, easing. . .

Making gifts for me and you!

 

This meant...

 

Long days spent piecing and pressing.

Then stippling, sashing, scrimming,

and serging with joy!

Embracing Canadians in a cuddle quilt

A gift for women, men, girls, boys!

 

Kwil’s Prairie Aunt lives in Alberta,

Just over the Rockies from Kwil.

So she quilted to the nearby west,

Before heading north and east—

A cross-country, love-filled thrill!

 

As she stitched and sewed the pieces

On scorching or freezing prairie days

She would recite

a precious piece-work poem.

She would smile and stitch and say:

 

Canada is a wondrous place. 

It is home to you and me. 

Canada is a loving place 

It is our patchwork country.  

 

Canadians are its people, 

People like you and me! 

Gentle, caring, proud, and strong 

A loving patchwork family. 

 

The Great Canadian Cuddle Quilt 

Will cover this vast, rugged country, 

Embracing young and old. 

A lofty patchwork quilt of love 

Keeping Canadians from getting cold. 

 

The Great Canadian Cuddle Quilt

grew over the Rockies

And the West Coast Mountains too.

It draped the Mackenzies

and the Pacific islands

As it grew and grew and grew!

 

In fact...

 

It grew north-east

across Canada’s upper third,

Yukon and Northwest Territories

so c-c-cold, rugged and vast.

Blocking and binding in Nunavut

Backstitching Canada’s future

with an echo-quilted past!

 

It grew south and west across

the rolling patchwork Prairies.

Alberta, Saskatchewan, and

Manitoba’s wide-open lands.

All the provinces she would

visit each summer

Roaring off to “fill her eyes”. . .

In her Prairie Aunt van!

 

The Great Canadian Cuddle Quilt

kept on growing,

Her running stitch zipped up and down

No matter how weary she became

She would not simper, sigh, or frown!

 

As she stitched and sewed the pieces

On scorching or freezing prairie days

She would recite

a precious piece-work poem.

She would smile and stitch and say:

 

Canada is a wondrous place. 

It is home to you and me. 

Canada is a loving place 

It is our patchwork country.  

 

Canadians are its people, 

People like you and me! 

Gentle, caring, proud, and strong 

A loving patchwork family. 

 

The Great Canadian Cuddle Quilt 

Will cover this vast, rugged country, 

Embracing young and old. 

A lofty patchwork quilt of love 

Keeping Canadians from getting cold. 

 

The Great Canadian Cuddle Quilt

kept right on growing

Draping Ontario and then Quebec!

Two great neighbours side-by-side

Sharing Hudson and James Bay

and “Les Grand Lacs”

 

It did not stop there, of course.

The Great Canadian Cuddle Quilt

kept on growing strong.

Newfoundland and New Brunswick were next,

Draping mainland and islands.

Reveling in the stashes

of hearty, hand-stitched song.

 

And yet. . .

 

On and on and on it grew!

Draping Nova Scotia

and Prince Edward Island too!

Provinces she loved to visit.

Oh, the colourful memories…

she would sit and stitch and sift through!

 

As she stitched and sewed the pieces

On scorching or freezing prairie days

She would recite

a precious piece-work poem.

She would smile and stitch and say:

 

Canada is a wondrous place.

It is home to you and me.

Canada is a loving place

It is our patchwork country.

 

Canadians are its people,

People like you and me!

Gentle, caring, proud, and strong

A loving patchwork family.

 

The Great Canadian Cuddle Quilt

Will cover this vast, rugged country,

Embracing young and old.

A lofty patchwork quilt of love

Keeping Canadians from getting cold.

 

Now her life’s work is done

It is her turn to sit back,

rock, roll, and rest!

She has given all to cuddle Canadians

A loving, growing family—

From north to south to east to west!

 

Some may think this is “batty,”

Like the “batting” in a lofty quilt!?

But Kwil's Prairie Aunt

comes from an earlier generation--

The time when Canada was built!

 

She knows better than to worry.

All doubts she has left far behind.

She recites her precious piece-work poem,

Stitching and sewing in her mind:

 

Canada is a wondrous place. 

It is home to you and me. 

Canada is a loving place 

It is our patchwork country.  

Canadians are its people, 

People like you and me! 

Gentle, caring, proud, and strong 

A loving patchwork family. 

The Great Canadian Cuddle Quilt 

Covers this vast, rugged country, 

Embracing young and old. 

A lofty patchwork quilt of love 

Keeping Canadians from getting cold. 

 

©1999 Kalen Marquis

 

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