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Cotton, the fabric of our lives

Carly Mul • Oct 19, 2023

This is a blog about a dear memory. My husband and I are on our way to Houston 2023, but we are taking a long detour and combine the (my) fabric trip with some hiking and biking in Texas State Parks in very nice weather. A few days ago, we drove in our rv from Nashville TN to Lake Catherine State Park in Arkansas and we passed the area that gave me the following wonderful memories in the year 2016. 


My Dutch friend Ineke had a quilt, one of her many incredible quilts,  accepted at Houston festival and I had invited her to go with me to Houston. She had to see her quilt hanging at the International Quilt Festival, such an honor!

She flew from Amsterdam into Washington DC and together we drove to Texas in a big 16 ft truck, loaded with fabrics to be sold later at my booth at Festival. The plan was to visit the Quilt museum in Paducah, KY. Then a stop at Moda in Dallas and then in time in Houston for Market and Festival.

We chatted all the way, enjoyjng the amount of time  the drive gave us and enjoyed Paducah, including Hancocks. For any European quilter used to only small shops, Hancocks is unbelievable in size. Ineke walked behind a grocery store size cart filled with bolts and couldn't believe her good fortune.


After Kentucky  we entered Arkansas. It didn't take long to see the cotton fields, a first time for Ineke. We stopped at a safe spot along the side of a road and took a closer look at the cotton. 2 fanatic quilters, fascinated by the organic source of their passion.  Wasn't this amazing?? Weren't we lucky to find this together?

As we got back to the truck we  noticed a lot of white stuff on the road. Paper? Plastic? We discovered those were tiny pieces of cotton, like feather dust. Must be sensitive for wind, we thought.....

We continued our drive and came closer to Marianna, I believe it names itself cotton capital of  the world. Cotton fields everywhere! After a stop at a traffic light we ended up driving behind a big truck and from this big truck little white flurries jumped onto the road. Cotton!! It was not just the wind... the truck lost some of its white load.

Immediately we looked at each other. Shall we? Of course. The decision to follow this truck was made quickly. We had some time. Where would it go to? What was happening to the cotton? Let's find out.

 After a few minutes and driving on very local roads, far away from the main road KY-Dallas, the truck entered an industrial area in the middle of some cotton fields. More trucks came in and left again, all bringing raw cotton.

There were no visitors. There were hardly any people. Just these truck drivers (like us;)) Ineke and I had some guts and parked  our truck filled with the the hottest of the hottest cotton fabrics (!) near a loading area. We looked around a little, peeked inside and  saw a working cotton gin: gigantic displays with machineries working on the cotton. Oh wow! A very friendly man approached us, asking if he could help us. We explained that we were a Dutch quilter and an American/Dutch  quilt shop owner on our way to the Houston quilt show and that we just loved cotton. The man smiled, heard our accents, and took us on a private tour through the cotton gin.  He loved cotton too! He had worked all his life in the gin  and I must confess his thick Arkansas' accent made it hard for us to follow him too. But he was extremely friendly and we were super happy, so the communication worked.

The cotton comes in as a plant, full with seeds, needles, branches. Ginning removes the seeds from the cotton,.. At the end of the cleaning, soft pure cotton is left and stacked in bales. Then it goes to mills for being produced into textiles.

Would we like to have some cotton? Ineke and I said yes and we each have now a big pile of cotton, reminder of this beautiful adventure and our friendship. Such a fabulous day! We continued  our way to Houston, making even more memories.

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