By day four of the dreary weather, Mama Chipmunk, with help from several of her grandchildren, had already dusted each and every book shelved along the stone walls of her cozy library.

Facing the prospect of yet another too-cold-to-go-outside day, Mama Chipmunk wrestled her current project out of the hall cupboard. Her grandchildren helped her unroll the quilting frame and balance it atop spindly folding wooden legs, and everyone settled in for a proper quilting bee: practicing tiny, neat stitches while talking about books they’d read and school and what they wanted for dinner and springtime plans.

The littlest grandchildren — too small to reach the quilting frame and too young, really, for needles and neat stitches — curled up together in their grandmother’s comfiest reading chair and promptly fell asleep.

(February 2022)

Story © Jennifer Singleton / Read+Purr

This is another vignette in my ongoing series of Tiny Garden Stories: peaceful 1-minute tales, full of cozy vibes, delicious details, and generous dollops of imagination & whimsy. Click one of the first two buttons below to go to (or back to, if that’s where you fell down the rabbit hole) either the Public Garden archive page or (if you’re a Story Club member) to the Private Garden page. Or click the third button to learn more about my Tiny Garden Stories. Want each week’s featured story delivered directly to your inbox? Subscribe to my Substack.