Free Calico Horses and the Patchwork Trail by Lorraine Turner

them.
     

    Her dad said goodbye as he drove away. Brian raced to the big tire swing hanging from a tree in the back yard. Shannon tossed her backpack onto the kitchen table and gave her grandmother a hug. Her grandmother smelled like baking and she always gave warm embraces that felt so reassuring. Grandmom never ever let go of the hug first and Shannon would soak it up with her head buried and arms wide, absorbing that special attention that was private and unshared with her little brother.
    “Any news yet?” asked her grandmother, who knew how much she was missing Carrie. Shannon shook her head and sighed.
    “You will.” Her grandmother walked into the other room. “Come see what I’m making.”
    Shannon was not in the mood to look at one of her grandmother’s sewing projects. She was feeling miserable and her pants were still sticky and she just wanted to hang out with Carrie. She rounded the corner into the little sewing room and stopped abruptly as her grandmother held something up. She stood in awe of this beautiful work of art. It was the beginning of what appeared to be a blanket made out of squares delicately stitched by hand. It seemed oddly familiar.
    “What’s this?” she asked, touching the tiny squares of blues, greens, lavenders, and golds.
    “Do you like it?
    “It’s beautiful, but what do you call it?” Shannon felt the tiny stitches in the fabric.
    “It’s a patchwork quilt. I can teach you to make one, if you’d like. You sew all the tiny squares together and it makes a quilt.”
    “So all of the flowers and colors become one design?” Shannon asked.
    “Yep.”
    “Did you invent this design?”
    “Well,” said her grandmother, “this form of needlework has been handed down through the generations. Older women taught younger women how to make warm blankets for cold winters out of scraps of old clothes or unused bits of fabric. See, it’s easy to sew with a little practice and before you know it you’ve made something lovely from old scraps.”
    “Wow,” said Shannon, now utterly amazed.
    “You take bits of colorful fabric and you fit them together and when it’s all finished you end up with this,” her grandmother said as she unfolded a completed quilt from within a nest of tissue paper.
    Shannon smiled as she looked at the masterpiece her grandmother was now proudly holding. I really do want to make one of these, she thought, looking at the unfinished blanket draped over a chair. It reminded her of a puzzle missing a few pieces. Her grandmother seemed to read her thoughts and wrapped the small blanket over Shannon’s shoulders.
    “You can make it all come together, Shannon, all on your own. This will help you stay busy when you’re lonely, and when you’re finished, you’ll have something to be proud of—your own special design which you made from forgotten fabric. Your very own Calico Patchwork Quilt.”

    Chapter 17

    Saddlecrest, Nevada – Save Our Mustangs (SOM) announced today that a palomino mare injured during the round-up was put out of its misery by rifle, leaving her young foal orphaned. A colt that collapsed and died after a helicopter chase was also among the first victims of the wild horse round-up in the Calico Mountains. In addition to the fatalities, a black stallion was injured Tuesday as he fought to avoid capture by jumping a six-foot fence and crashing through barbed wire. An eyewitness report was given to this publication along with photographs. The officials in charge of the round-up had this to say…

     

    Sam pushed a thumbtack to straighten the flyer that one of her guests had recently posted. It was part of a news article that had been highlighted in bright yellow and pasted on fluorescent green paper. Below the article in bold letters were the words: JOIN “SAVE OUR MUSTANGS” AND BE THE VOICE OF THE WILD.
    How sad, thought Sam, realizing she was only reading a portion of the editorial. The next paragraph trailed off the page in