Some of my favorite memories as a child are fishing with my dad and my sister. Sometimes, we had a good catch. Other times we didn’t. Regardless, we always came back with quite a story. We love retelling those stories when we get together. One of our favorite stories is fishing between two hydroelectric dams. After a few hours in the canoe and more than a few nibbles, a guy in another boat shouted to ask us if we parked on the beach. Dad responded that was us. The guy suggested we paddle back as they were letting the water out of the upper dam, which meant the water level was rising. We paddled right up to the car door and had to push the car out of the sand. That day we had quite a catch, we brought home a pickerel and a great story. A few of the stories remained a secret from my mom until we were a bit older.  Like dad teaching us to smoke cigars to keep the bugs from biting….

What a catch is like our fish stories. The fish aren’t always the highlight. Sometime what you find with the fish that are just as interesting. When designing What a Catch, I thought about what else you may find when fishing in on the pier, beach or boat. Obviously, you catch different types of fish. You may find a star fish along the beach or in your net. My favorite are the turtles that glide through the water but stubble onto shore.

This pattern uses traditionally pieced turtles, star fish templates, and foundation pieced fish to create your own fishing tale. So like our fishing stories, What a Catch will hold your interest with the various fabrics and methods of piecing. The pattern is designed for Dear Stella’s Hook, Line and Sinker collection which is due to ship in January. When finished, What a Catch measure 50″ x 74″.  The pattern for What a Catch is currently available in the shop.

What a Catch – Pieced by Cathy Drum

I want to thank my pattern tester Cathy Drum for her patience and good cheer. She made a beautiful quilt top using some of her stash as the collection isn’t available yet. Isn’t her work beautiful!

I hope you enjoy putting What a Catch together as much as we did.

Happy Quilting 🙂

Laureen