All quilters with cats know that cats and quilts go together. They have this sixth sense when a quilt is being laid out and are there to curl up on it in a trice. So it’s quite hard to get a quilt picture without one of our two cats photo bombing it unashamedly. Even when it’s just a couple of small blocks there they are preening themselves for a photo. Well very sadly our lovely grey cat Minty won’t be doing any more quilt photo shoots, as a collision with a car and even with nine lives it wasn’t enough to save him. I doubt if he knew anything about it and he’d had a good life albeit at nearly 6 years old it was too short.

I’m certainly not blaming the driver, Minty was the colour of tarmac and frankly not the brightest of cats. We agonised about him becoming an outdoor cat because he wasn’t let out other than on a harness for the first two years with us but he spent much of his indoor life plotting to escape. His best trick was to hang back when the doorbell rang waiting for it to open and while I’d be dealing with the visitor he’d  dash through our legs then make a break for freedom. I could see from his increasingly irritable behaviour that the frustration of being kept in was telling on him so in the end, on the basis that it’s quality of life not quantity that counts, we let him out.  I don’t regret that for an instant, with his ears pricked forward and his tail upright as he ventured outside he loved the freedom and excitement of being able to explore and hunt. I think we will see more birds at our bird feeder now.

While I have no regrets about that decision I’m grateful that our other cat Skye isn’t as keen to go outside and if she does get out through curiosity so far she’s kept close to the house whereas Minty would dash away as fast as his legs could carry him!

He is very much missed and I can’t believe I won’t see his face at the window asking to be let in again. It is all a bit of a shock  but as this blog is my quilting journal and Minty was part of it I thought this quilt tribute  would be fitting and mark this sad time.