I keep a cardboard box by my sewing chair that started out as a scrap basket and has quietly turned into something else. Every button that falls off, every ribbon from a birthday gift, my youngest granddaughter's first lost tooth that the tooth fairy forgot to come get so I kept it, a bit of my mama's old housecoat that's down to about four inches of cloth now. Nothing in there is useful on its own. But it's all I reach for when I'm stuck on a quilt, every single time.

I started a new piece this morning and the plan was red and gold, a church window thing I been carrying in my head. Sat down and it just wouldn't come. So I opened that box and pulled out a pale yellow scrap of my grandmother's apron, faded almost white where she'd wiped her hands a thousand times. That's going in the middle of it now and the whole thing turned. You don't plan them moments. You just keep the box close and let it speak when it's ready.