Special Order: Patricia’s Cow Pillows!

Sew…My friend Patricia loves cows! She is a city girl born and raised in Mexico City. Now she lives here in La Paz. We have been friends for years. And she is a true individual. She keeps balloons and ribbons in here purse, when she sees kids she stops to blow up a balloon, ties a ribbon to it and then ties the balloon to the child’s wrist. She once talked a policeman out of giving a ticket to a man she did not even know. “ He was poor” she said. “He could not pay a ticket.”

Sew we were out for breakfast one Sunday. Patricia reached into her purse and passed over a stack of photographs. “Would you like to see my cows?” she asked, as if she was asking if I would like to see baby pictures.

“Sure!” said I.

And sew, I browsed through a stack of pure white and black and white bovines grazing on a small grass patch outside in an urban setting.

“Where did these cows come from?” I asked.

“They were just there, outside my gym. They must have been following the Spring vegetation.”

“Aren’t they beautiful?”

“Well , er, of course they are”

“And you know, I love the way they smell too!”

I told you she was an individual, with a capital I.

Patricia is so real and true, that you just have to love her and smile and naturally understand that she loves cows.

I asked her beloved Gordon to email the photos to me.

And two Christmases ago I made her a Gracie Bag by Lazy Girl Designs. I printed the cow pictures on fabric and also wrote “Patricia’s Cows” and made them the inside pockets of the bag.

This year I asked her if she would like to go through my Lazy Girl patterns and fabric and choose the design of her choice for her birthday.

“No” she said” I would like you to make me some pillows with my cows on them. I like to look at them.”

And sew, here are Patricia’s cows on pillows.

I was in the best fabric store in La Paz with my friend Mary and I said “Too bad they don’t have any cow print fabric here.” La Paz fabric stores are very limited in what they have. I never believed they would have any novelty print.

Mary asked the young man that was cutting her fabric if they had fabric with “piel de la vaca” (skin of the cow) and he said he did in the back room.

“Mary” I said, “It’s probably real cowhide…I don’t want that!”

Lo and behold, they had some pajama fabric with a cow print! And that is how Patricia’s pillows came to have the perfect backing fabric.

La Paz is the capital of Baja California Sur, with a population of 200,000. It is a city. There are not a lot of pastures near downtown.

But farmers let their cows wander wherever they like, so this set of cows ended up on the grassy circle in front of Patricia’s gym.

There is a clash of cultures in La Paz. The ranchers will not give way to cars, private property and highways. Cows are left to wander. One night two of our friends were wakened by an awful commotion. They were sure a cow was giving birth…sideways. They turned on their patio lights and could not believe their eyes…a cow had fallen in their pool and was furiously bellowing it’s frustration and trying to climb up the side. Crashing and splashing and cracking the pool tile, the cow mooed and flailed. The more it slipped the louder it wailed.

Imagine trying to get a two-ton dumb, scared and angry creature to climb the steps out of your pool! They managed to rope it, so with MS pulling from the pool’s edge, and MR in the water pushing the cows bony rump, they managed to get the poor thing to the steps and out of the pool. Not everyone loves cows!