New Babies, No More Marlboros & Quilts...

The following microfiction piece that I wrote entitled "New Babies, No More Marlboros, and Quilts!" was inspired by uber-talented visual artist Annie Lee's fab-tastic painting titled Grandma's Hands.

New Babies, No More Marlboros, and Quilts by Tiffany Gordon

Hey y'all! Guess what!? My only child, Syreeta, is preggo again with twin boys. I don't know why she waited until my grandson Bronzer turned twelve and Bronzer's twin sisters Maybelline and L'Oreal turned ten to add to her brood. 🤱🏾🤱🏾

Baby Revlon and Baby MAC will be here any day now. I'm just funning about the names, y'all. Syreeta hasn't picked out the new twin boys' names yet. I hope that she and her new husband, Brittin, break tradition and choose to stay away from the makeup-themed names for good this time. As it stands, the only jobs that my grandbabies Bronzer, L'Oreal, and Maybelline will be able to land right now are clowns for children's birthday parties at Party City or Chuck E. Cheese. 🤡 Looking on the bright side of things, I guess they could each go by their middle names, Caleb, Loyalty, and Mckenna.💫

Guess what, y'all! This may come as a shock to you, but I'm a closet quilter. I truly enjoy it; it calms my nerves more than Marlboros ever did when I was a two-day smoker at age 18. Don't ask y'all. I was trying to impress a boy. At the tender age of 19, I vowed to never again play boo-boo the fool and compromise my health for anyone ever again! ✌🏾

According to my Aunt Mae, I actually come from a long line of quilters. My sweet grandmother Texanna even won the Southwest's Best Quilter Contest one year in San Antonio, Texas, eons ago. 🤩

My Granny T loved to make quilts for her grandkids. She even went as far as to add bits and pieces of each grandkid's personality to each quilt that she created. Since I was always the little fashion bug of the bunch, Granny T decided to sew scraps from a pair of $75 Stanwick jeans from my wardrobe when I was in 4th grade into the heart of the quilt that she made for me. Those horrendous jeans from my elementary school days had the nerve to say, "Kick me" on each back pocket. To this day I still don't know what possessed Momma and Granny to buy those jeans for me from Penney's. I don't think that they realized that I was tormented up and down the halls of my elementary school every time that I wore those atrocious jeans. Why couldn't they have bought me a pair of jeans that said "Give Me Money" 🤑 on the back instead? If they had, I may have become Billita Gates by now. 😜

Later today I think I'll finish the quilt that I was working on for my husband Arnez (affectionately known as Arnie by friends and family) for his birthday when he passed away unexpectedly nearly five years ago. ✨

I have a sentimental reason for chosing the main subjects of Arnie's quilt. You see, when Arnie and I were in 6th grade, we became good friends, and Arnie's nickname for me was Butterfly since I've always been a social butterfly, while my childhood nickname for Arnie was Beetle because he used to be fascinated by them as well as a big collector of them when he was a kid. Therefore, as an ode to our nicknames and special bond, I decided to incorporate butterflies and beetles throughout the body of Arnie's quilt. I hope that Arnie approves and that he is smiling down from heaven at it. 😇

After I finish Arnie's quilt. I'll be making quilts for each of my grandkids as well. Truthfully though, with the economy as bad as it is right now, I'm beginning to run out of money for fabric and related quilting materials; therefore, Syreeta, better cough up some quilting money, or her future babies may end up quiltless. Lol 😂

I'm just jivin y'all. I'll hit up my pastor and my church family before I allow that to happen! 😁

But on a serious note, Syreeta better have "the chat" with Brittin about which one of them will be getting "the snip," or she could end up like "the old woman who lived in the shoe who had so many kids that she didn't know what to do!" 🤣 Lol