Almost 3 years ago, my husband and I were in Florida visiting my daughter (I live in Rochester, NY....a good 23 hours away). We had planned on flying home on Saturday morning, but the airlines cancelled all flights when the weathermen up north predicted a blizzard (it never happened). They told us that maybe they could fly us out Tuesday evening. My daughter needed her house back and we needed to get back for work....but over and above that I just had a very strong feeling that we needed to rent a car and drive home Sunday morning. To make a long story short, 1/2 hour into the ride, my brother called to tell me that my mother was dying and I should hurry home because they didn't think she would last the day (she hadn't been sick when I left the week before). I was frantic to get back quickly, but had to accept that it wasn't going to happen. I had started a hand quilting project for the vacation...a simple black wholecloth with spiraling circles large stitched all over in bright colored pearl cotton. This one piece of quilting kept my sanity (with the help of my DH) for the whole ride home. My mother passed away 2 hours after the first phone call but she had her family (minus me) with her. I called the quilt "spiraling out of control" because that's what it kept me from doing. It won a second place prize in my guild's quilt show for the hand quilting....but I really think it was this story attached to it that won for me.