When one Reddit user posted a photo of a mysterious embroidered square from a child’s alphabet blanket, the internet was left scratching their heads.
In a post, that can be seen here, with more than 18,000 upvotes on Reddit, the patch, supposedly representing the letter “P,” featured a conical white shape outlined in red stitching, sitting on a pale blue background. Below it, a brown rectangle suggested a door or window.
"We can't figure this one out," the title said, as the original poster Always1kMilesAwaythey revealed in the caption the mysterious symbol had been puzzling them for "years." "Our best guess is pot-belly stove," they added.
Decoding The Quilt
The blanket, reportedly meant to help children learn the alphabet, included squares with comforting clarity: J was for Jacks, N for Needle, and Q for Quilt. But when it came to P, even the Reddit hive mind struggled.
“I get wanting to increase a child’s vocabulary, but what is with these obscure objects for alphabet pictures?” one user, JackieSnarker, said. “Parrot? Pencil? Pineapple? Pig? Why go so obscure?”
Suggestions poured in, ranging from the sweetly innocent to the hilariously misguided.
User Bonfire0fTheManatees said: “Pagoda, but I thought ‘pantyliner’ or ‘pad’ for way longer than I should have.”
"Piano, it’s an overhead view," wrote user Particular_Nothing59.
Others guessed pinny (short for pinafore), or pizza oven. But the most popular response was pagoda, a Hindu or Buddhist temple.
Adding more detail in the form of edits as the internet continued to scratch its head, the poster said: "Edit: Personally, I think the abstraction of this to pagoda is a bit much considering the other patches, and I've never seen an apron/pinafore with a cloth piece that covers the face.
"Final Edit: Someone below mentioned that the top flap would tuck into one's clothes and that their grandma had one. Thus, I think "pinafore" is the answer; "solved" went to first person to suggest it."
But it seems the solve may have premature. After more debate it seemed that the mystery only deepened. The original poster returned with even more updates: the same design apparently appeared in an earlier art series sold by Pottery Barn, where it was a pagoda.
Somewhere along the line, it seemed that the design was altered, and possibly reinterpreted, until it resembled a pinafore instead.
“It seems Pottery Barn bought this from an artist and then changed it for some reason to this, and subsequently a penguin,” the poster explained. “I think the change here makes it a pinafore, but the original art was of a pagoda.”
Finally, in true Reddit fashion, the community settled on a tongue-in-cheek compromise. “It’s a Pinna-goda. Are we all equally unhappy now?” the poster wrote.
Confusing Kids' Belongings
The textile mystery is not the first time a child’s item has left people confused. Earlier this year a woman shared her confusion at her young niece’s ABC book that had a particularly unusual letter X.
Meanwhile children’s homework has also left many confused. Like the spelling assignment that kept people guessing on Threads. Another Dad shared his embarrassment after he revealed he could not figure out his daughter's third-grade math problem.
Newsweek reached out to Always1kMilesAway via Reddit for comment.
