Embroidering Minnesota's State Drink - Art Every Day Month - Day 18

I'm continuing to work on the hand-embroidered squares for the Minnesota state quilt that I'm making this month. Yesterday afternoon and this morning, I embroidered Minnesota's state drink - milk.

The quilt square is about 12 1/2" x 12 1/2" and is from a white bed sheet that no longer was being used. I used 100% cotton embroidery floss in three shades of pink and black.

Why pink? The label for skim milk is pink, and that's the color I associate with milk.

The stitching is basic - just a simple backstitch on this quilt square. I chose to do an outline only versus filling in any section as well.

Milk was designated as the official state drink of Minnesota in 1984. Minnesota produces 9.7 billion pounds of milk a year (6% of the nation’s total) and ranks sixth in dairy production among the states.

Olivia petting a cow at a dairy farm

during a 4-H meeting.

(Taken in June 2011.)

Each dairy cow gives about 6.5 gallons of milk per day. Less than half of this milk is consumed as a beverage - excess is used for butter, cheese, ice cream, yogurt, milk powder, and other processed products.

Sophia with a calf.

Both the girls want to learn more about dairy cows this year, and

want to show a dairy calf at the county fair

as one of their 4-H projects.

(This was taken in August 2008.)