A Christmas Gift Poem

The whole week before Christmas, you know what I did?

I stayed home and sewed on a nine-foot-long squid.

The gift that my boyfriend had wanted for years:

I decided to make one, in spite of my fears.

Twelve yards of pink fabric was where it began;

I patterned and researched and worked out a plan.

The cutting was easy. The stuffing was harder.

I'd've done it a month ago, if I'd been smarter.

The folks down at Wal-Mart were silent with scorn

As I checked out my goods on a cold, icy morn:

Ten pounds of white fluff and a dozen cheap pillows

To fill up my Squid with the softest of billows.

The tentacles, each five feet long as they are,

Were hardest to sew on (and fit in the car).

The eyes were the simplest: I just glued them on.

The fiberfill? Half the world's stock is now gone.

The day before Christmas, I stood there and stared

At this huge cephalopod that I had prepared

And pondered just how this gift might be received;

"Love it or hate it, it's done. I'm relieved."

I hauled it the half-mile to Chef-Boy's lair

Arranged it, half-sitting, on his bed with care;

And stepped back, unsure of the scale of the thing

Now that it was finished, The Minky Squid King.

If I had been thinking, before I had lugged it

The half-mile to David's, I ought to have bugged it.

I missed his reaction, but here's what he said:

"I screamed, then I laughed, then I hugged its pink head."

He loves it! I'm happy. The project is done.

Though it drove me half-crazy, I guess it was fun.

Dave filled me with fear, though, when I heard him say,

"Now all it needs, dear, is a toothfish. For prey."

(Yes, I did make a nine-foot-long stuffed pink Colossal Squid out of Minky fabric for Chef-Boy. Yes, I do have pictures. Not very good ones at this point, but some. Once we get more pictures of Squidly [we plan to pose him sitting at the computer, on the couch, driving, etc.] I promise to post them.)

(Also, please don't ask me for patterning advice on Squid. I did it on the fly, cutting away the bits of fabric that weren't Squidlike. It's testament to my nonexistent sewing skills that the damn thing turned out approximately one-third larger than I had intended it to. Six feet by two? That's a manageable squid. Nine by three? Not so much.)