"The Best Medicine" by Amy Pabst was inspired by an antique quilt from World War I she found on Barbara Brackman's blog.

The original quilt Amy saw was made by a woman named Anna Horn during World War I when her son Albert Horn was out fighting. Both mother and son shared the initials A.H. which Anna put in over and over in the quilt, and Amy feels that maybe she did this as a way to think of him while he was away. When Amy saw the original, she thought of it more as a funny quilt, as she read the initials as both H.A. and A.H., which when read the first way created the words Ha Ha continuously. This then inspired the name of Amy's quilt, The Best Medicine, because, as the saying goes, laughter is the best medicine.