This and That • June 2026

June 7, 2026June 6, 2026 Elizabeth E.6 Comments

Let’s go to the movies! The Oh! Granny movies! If I could wave a magic wand I’d change the world so you could see the congregation of Grannies we’ve all started together, but this screen capture video will have to suffice. If you make a Granny Square, I’ll add you to the group — just tag me on Instagram.

Here are my two starter Grannies for June:

Block #9 (above) and Block #10 (below)
If you want to jump in, it’s never too late. More info is on a previous post, plus a free pattern.

Obviously my micro-season of red, white and blue has influenced this last one. And by the way, I really enjoyed reading all your micro-seasons, left in the comments on the last post. After hearing my stories about my garment sewing (see below), Wendy came up with another micro-season: WWIT, or What Was I Thinking? I find myself in that season often.

Did you see this one as we rolled the movie? This is from Allison; she made a pictorial chart in Canva, and is adding in her grannies as she makes them.

I’ve got some more squares cut up in my sewing room, and will soon get to making more.

I keep running into Granny Square designs. This is from PomPom London, a purse maker. I may or may not have just purchased a red purse from them.

My apologies, this model in this color is apparently sold out, but I also like the one-zip City Bag in blue, if that suits you. I’t ‘ve had it for a few months now, and has the best cross-body straps (hands free!) and I can even fit a small, short water bottle in there. I’d say, if you’re hot for a red purse, check back as they replenish their stock often, or choose another (they have three different reds). I’ve now seen three different copycat ads for purses in my IG feed (see below about junk in our media feeds), but PomPom London is the original. And yes, each bag has a pompom, or tassel or whatever.

Short Story: Hair dryer died. Got a new, different (better) one, based on the dryer in my hotel room in Paris. (PS. I mention these items, but no one is paying me.) This year has seemed to be the Time Of Getting Things Repaired & Fixed/Replaced, and I’m getting a little weary, but there you go.

Chimney collar repair, with Tobi on top and David as assistant. And more great news is this:

Yes, the stair bannister was finished, and delivered (late one night, felt sorry for Bryan, but he’s a good guy and his IG feed is fascinating to look at, if you love watching other people work).

Short Story: router died.

Ending: We’re back on the internets with a new mesh network. The bigger problem is that home repairs TAKE TIME, even when you are not the one doing them. I mean, ~~gawking~~ checking on the guy up on the roof seriously takes away from the sewing, if you know what I mean. And don’t even get me started on the lengthy tale of getting the router up and running.

However…I finished up the final squircle!!

I started sewing these nine months ago.

And here they all are, sewn together. (Big smiles.)

Now to consider borders. I have one I’m thinking about, simply because the quilt is intended for a taller person, and more length is needed. Did I mention already that a partner in crime, Gladi, has also finished her squircles?

Now for the WWIT micro-season: a pattern review. And pattern-making review.

My friend Susan, in Australia, has made two of these jumpers, and because of her success, I decided to try. I was a pretty experienced sewer from back in the day, but my advice for this jumper is: Take Your Time.

First off, find the pattern. I went to the Internets (now that it was fixed) and found the pattern at Lakes Makerie. Usually I print off my PDF clothing patterns at Tape Free Patterns (recommend highly) but Lakes Makerie had an option where they would print it off and send it to me for a small extra charge. I liked this! It didn’t include an envelope for the pattern like Tape Free does, but their service was very convenient and fairly quick.

Top two (first two) photos are of the back pleat. I did a modified length — not too short, not too long — and didn’t like how they finished the pleat. I just did a standard finish. Third photo is the inside, and yes, I turned my pocket fabric right side out so I could see the beautiful fabric, hoarded since the Dawn of the Century. This is a navy cotton/linen lightweight fabric, with a metallic thread running through the slubby face (even though it looks grey in the last photo).

This jumper has a scoop neckline, which I lowered by 1/2″ (upon the advice of those on social media), two button plackets on either side, generous front pockets and (last photo) two back patch pockets which are getting unpicked soon. Why? Because while I tried it on and loved it (and see Susan’s post link for how her sister looks in hers), but on my smaller frame it just looked a bit too blocky; the pockets don’t help.

This is why I make my clothes, so I can make my clothes how I want.

So I added two self ties, and stitched them on about 6″ in from the side seams so they’d line up with the shoulders. They help define the waist area a bit more. Button shopping was a challenge without any sewing shops nearby, but I did find some at Hobby Lobby — cheesy plastic ones — but they’ll keep the dress on. On the advice of others, I also cut a smaller size. Do This.

On the left is the Box Box Dress (Merchant & Mills), and on the right is the Hope Dress (Style Arc). I’ve noticed that I tend to find the next dress I want to make from social media and blogs, so here are two that I have made and enjoyed. I did add pockets to the Box Box dress, as well as modifying the sleeve, as I like my sleeves a bit longer.

Here’s a pocket pattern (free download) if you need one.

OPQuilt Pocket_Pattern Download

Cut it out, hold it up along the side of your garment, and just try it for where you want it, making sure your fingers can touch the bottom of the pocket bag. I use a different method of putting in pockets these days (shorter video HERE, and the longer video is HERE). My first pocket installation using the newer method was a bit ragged, but now I’m getting pretty good at it, only because the volume of mistakes I initially made sent me on the Path to Knowledge.

Okay, that’s all for garment sewing — I try to put this topic on Instagram, but just couldn’t include a pocket pattern on that site for you. 🙂 According the latest, if we’re smart we’ll all get off of social media, given that most of what we see is ads, even when you think it’s just a someone-or-other showing your their favorite thing:

Click HERE to listen. I did want to read the article by Lane Brown, but can’t get past the paywall. Kai Ryssdal is good host on the Marketplace podcast, and the show is not political in the least. Which is how I’ll close.

I said something off-hand last week about the upcoming California Primary Election to a neighbor when we encountered each other during our morning walks. It did not go well. I was upset for days at how it blew up quickly, but then — the quilting world came to my rescue with this:

My Stars and Stripes
Probably made by Ella Evans
Made in Tennessee, United States; Circa 1900
Cotton
IQM 2013.025.0001

The International Quilt Museum writes: “In this piece, we see the American flag as an enduring symbol of American patriotism. Made by Ella Evans, this quilt holds identical Unions in opposite corners each with forty-five stars — an accurate rendition of American states in 1900. Evans made this quilt for a man named Otis Golden. Evans cared for Otis and his brothers after their mother passed away.”

Even on opposite sides, we can still be part of one entity. Our church did a nationwide discussion of the Constitution last week, and my husband and I took the opportunity (and reminder) to read the full Constitution. It was instructive, a bit over our heads in some places (the Senate’s interpretations on the side did help), but it reminded me, as does the flag quilt by Evans, that we are all in this together.

Thanks so much for reading, I appreciate you very much–

300 and Beyond · 300 Quilts · Patterns by Elizabeth of OPQuilt · Red, White and Blue · Something to Think About

Quilter Micro-Seasons • Aerial Beacon Quilts

May 31, 2026May 30, 2026 Elizabeth E.11 Comments

I read recently how Japan has multiple micro-seasons, not just our talked-about four. Some of the micro-seasons are East Wind Melts The Ice, or First Cherry Blossoms, or Great Rains Sometimes Fall. Devon Peticolas has worked out that New York City has 12, and one of my favorites is what he calls “Hell’s Front Porch.” (photos by my DH and I)

Apparently, one of my quilting micro seasons is Make Something in Red, White, and Blue. I know people who have this season year-round (Carol, I’m looking at you), but mine just comes around about every May, right around Memorial Day.

Here is The Kid Sister to Aerial Beacon, a quilt finished some time ago, but the when the Computer Ate My Homework (aka, my Patterns), it took me two more years to redraw and re-write to get the pattern out.

But now I have.

The pattern, Aerial Beacon, is now my PayHip Shop.

But there’s another there, too: Santa’s Night Ride, which was published in Simply Vintage Magazine, December 2023. The copyright restrictions are now past, so now you also can get this in PayHip, my online pattern shop.

Why didn’t I combine them? The publisher wasn’t interested in the larger quilt, but did like the smaller version, so I wrote that up and it was published. When I went back to finish up the original Aerial Beacon quilt — because I included so many photo illustrations and variations of the pattern (FPP, EPP and regular piecing), as well as three different border treatments — the page count became quite large, and I didn’t want to freak anyone out with the size of the two combined. But I’ve got them both on sale for a couple of weeks (no coupon needed) and combined it’s about the price of one pattern. (So you don’t have to choose, if you don’t want to.)

If your quilty micro-season is calling out for a red, white, and blue quilt, here’s my recipe for this one. Make the four blocks, then add a 1″ border. I added cornerstones in that border.

I tried a new-to-me half-square-triangle method when I found a small baggie of already cut blue and red/white print triangles, cut off from some other project (I have no idea what). I had recently purchased the Quilt in a Day Triangle Square Up Ruler, and I laid the 2 1/2″ marking on the stitched line, then trimmed. Then I pressed to the dark side, as always, and trimmed the dog ears. I was only lacking 7 half-square triangles for my outer border, showing that truly, I am in the right micro-season and the red, white, and blue gods are smiling down on me.

I had a bit of fabric leftover from making these center blocks, so I used that fabric in the corners of my two outer borders.

I’d originally made these red, white and blue blocks to test the Aerial Beacon pattern using the cut-out-the-pattern-pieces method, rather than using the foundation-paper-pieced method. I do think it’s easier to do the FPP method, but take your time with the first block to get the hang of it.

But since school is out in some places, and going-to-be-out-soon in others, maybe you are in your Go To The Beach micro-season, and need something seagreen and sunny. Then maybe make it up in these colors.

All three together in the garden, showing their relative sizes: 26 1/2″, 36 1/2″ and 65″ square.

I’ve been trying to think of other micro seasons for quilters. Certainly the Sew Until You Are Too Tired To See Straight could be put on the calendar somewhere around October and end the night before Christmas. There’s also the New Fabric Lines Drop, which happens right after quilt market. I can think of also think of seasons for Make a New Tote Bag (right before a trip somewhere), Clean out the Stash to Make Room For More (when you see a new group of beautiful fabrics). And I just noticed ads pushing holiday quilts: I detect another micro-season heading our way!

Whatever season you are in, savor it–

Some Real Aerial Beacons

I wrote about Aerial Beacon here, if you want to read about the genesis of it all, and here, for the early signposts, the large concrete arrows, and how airplanes navigated once upon a time (scroll down in the post to get past the Ladies’ quilt). Here are some more images.

From Underwood Archives: UIG5450625 Chicago, Illinois: July 13, 1928
The new Chicago central aerial beacon atop the Roanoke Tower will begin operation on July 15th. It will be lit by the Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Aeronautics, and will be visible for 100 miles in every direction from LaSalle & Madison Streets in Chicago.; Photo © Underwood Archives.

This one is in the hills overlooking St. George, Utah.

Yep. I planned those airplane contrails in the background.

100 Quilts · 300 and Beyond · Free Download · Free Quilt Pattern · Quilts

Keep Your Eye on the Sparrow

May 24, 2026May 23, 2026 Elizabeth E.10 Comments

Eric Hodel, a scientist and writer of The Intrinsic Perspective substack letter, described a breakthrough by AI this week. It involves the above image, which was the answer proposed 80 years ago by mathematician Paul Erdös to the question “If you place a set of nodes down on a plane, how can you organize this set of nodes such that as many pairs of nodes as possible are an exact fixed distance apart?”

If you are a quilter, like I am, you looked at this and thought, Can I make a quilt out of this geometric design? for that’s what we are all about; that’s what caught my eye. Do I understand the above mathematical question? Not in the least, but here’s the new answer, courtesy of machine learning:

Nature magazine’s headline reads “AI cracks 80-year-old mathematics challenge — researchers are astonished.” The first drawing looks like that string art we made in grade school, where there are all these nails driven into a board in a grid. That was as far as we could see, as much as we knew to do at that early time, and we put our heads down and concentrated and wrapped our string around the nails.

Years go by, we get busy, advances in science and in life are made and we get older, we realize the wisdom in the old adage my mother used to say about keeping your eye on the sparrow: paying attention to what’s important. I could say something here about AI and its intrusion into our lives: some of it helpful, some of it not. However, I’d rather pay attention to the things I can make with my hands, keeping my eye on things I can discover myself, building relationships with the humans around me.

I made baby quilts for all of my grandchildren. This is Alex’s and I used one of my favorite block at the time: a nine-patch. This little boy turned 22 last week, I say with some shock.

That year I was teaching Creative Writing while finishing up my MFA. I sewed very little for two years. It felt like forever.

But it did end, here, with my parents and family in a jubilant day. They — and the grading and the teaching and the going to classes and the little first grandchild I held in my arms — are now gone or grown. Did I keep my eye on the sparrow? The answer is obvious on some levels: the university gave me my degree. But my eyes are not everywhere, nor can they be. And we move on, hopeful for forgiveness for what we miss, or cannot yet see.

And here I am now. I do not teach, whether it be in a classroom full of 20-somethings, or in a Guild workshop, which I also did for a while. I still collect interesting quotes (see the Steinbeck, below). I live a relatively quiet life, as our children are all grown, the grandchildren nearly so. How to keep my eye on these sparrows, now that they have flown away?

I do what I can, keeping in mind my mother’s advice, but also realizing she said it for herself. The small quilt is titled His Eye is On The Sparrow, and it comes from the song that continues, “and I know He watches me.” And so I depend on others. I let a lot more things go, I get a lot less done, but it is still a gratifying life: this making quilts and writing about it…and seeing the sparrows when they fly home for a visit.

Thanks for reading, and thanks for keeping your eye on this sparrow–

Postscript: As a thank-you, I gave my grad advisor a quilt I’d made in a Mystery Quilt Along before I started grad school. Besides Alex’s quilt, this is about all I sewed during that time.

We work in our darkness a great deal with little real knowledge of what we are doing. ~John Steinbeck

The quote on the blackboard (chalk! how quaint!): I wrote a quote on the board every day, and had them free-write for 5 minutes in their journals to loosen up their writing hands and minds.

Alex’ baby quilt was Quilt #55. My grad advisor’s quilt was Quilt #56. The sparrow is a free mini-quilt pattern, available in an earlier post on this blog.

300 and Beyond · Free Download · Free Quilt Pattern · Granny Square Quilt · Patterns by Elizabeth of OPQuilt · Quilts

This and That • MarAprilMay 2026

May 16, 2026May 18, 2026 Elizabeth E.14 Comments

Let’s begin this overdue missive with the mundane: the stair rails in our house. This sticker belongs to Bryan, who I finally called in to finish the project after mucking around with it since March 6th.

I need a sticker that has the words “finisher” and “quilter” in it, although I haven’t yet figured out in which order the words would go.

This is when I called him. We’d had other recent attempts at this project of refinishing the stair rails, including a feeble attempt by Yours Truly, but in the end I called Bryan of Fine Wood Finishers to get the job done. It was needed as they probably hadn’t been refinished in the life of the house (about 50 years).

Do we exude this kind of confidence and fun? He spent some time trying to get it in his shorter van, and in the end needed a bit of a red flag. I’m your gal! I called as I zipped upstairs, ripped off a strip of red fabric and brought it back down to him. Now we just let him do his magic; I’ll keep you updated. (He does have a bigger van for delivery; no worries.)

Apparently all our businesses are in warehouses now. I took my husband to his physical therapy and was off by one block. We were at Jump and Shout Therapy, instead of Marketplace Therapy. While he was in there, I sewed squircles while I waited in the car…

…but first I took a walk around the complex where I took photos. (I’m always taking photos.)

That skeleton of metal reminded me of this sweet little chapel in the Blois Chateau in Blois, France, where even the ceilings were amazing. And this reminded me that I wanted to show you this:

Now that you know there are 640 of them, and that she made each one different, you’ll want to see some detail shots (click to enlarge any photo):

This is a quilt from the Pour l’Amour du Fils show in Nantes, France. I did include some more photos in the most recent post, but rather than overwhelm you, I’ll drop some more in here and there over the next while, like this one with 640 different little purses and dresses.

My sister Susan also did some traveling, but to London. She’s become an avid sewer, getting me interested again in garment sewing. She’s a fan of Merchant & Mills, so traveled out to Rye to see their enterprise and buy fabric. While there, they photographed her for their well-known inspiration called Social Club, and put her up on Instagram. Wow! (Doesn’t she look fabulous?)

I squircled while in doctor’s offices this month, too, keeping vigil while my husband was there. I’m really getting close to done, as I’m trying to keep up with Gladi, who has finished her squares.

Our church is dedicating a new temple not too far from our house, the Yorba Linda Temple, and we had a chance to go for their Open House to tour the building before it’s closed to the public. As always, I’m drawn to pattern and visual texture, so I loved the stained glass, done by Holdman Studios.

My photo at dusk, on the left. Another photo of this motif, from the Holdman Studios’ Instagram, is on the right (which also has more pictures). That would make a marvelous center to a quilt, right?

I tend to carry home smaller things from my travels, like stickers and an elegant candy box. Sadly, I ate the last one of the little sweet bits inside while writing this post.

But water bottles are also a prime souvenir for me, as they remind me of my experiences. Oh, and tote bags for my grocery shopping (our state has a no plastic bag rule), but I won’t show you my collection at this time.

One last quilt from Nantes: a granny square-inspired quilt, with “granny lanterns.”

Granny Square Updates

Oh Granny Original Post

Oh Granny Update Post

Besides the one you saw a couple of weeks ago, here are four more. I need to make eight total for May’s allotment, so have a few to go. Others who are playing along have posted theirs, too, on Instagram:

Since hashtags are dead in Instagram, if you want to join the gang, either leave a comment on this post, or on This Instagram Post, and I’ll add your account to the list I’m keeping on that post. If you have a a photo and don’t use Instagram, I’m happy to post it up here, or link to your blog. I’m also on BlueSky for those who have left Meta behind, although I don’t know if you need to join to see my blocks on there.

I’ve also reworked some earlier handouts and patterns. This is a digital image of four pinwheel blocks, but I really only made one. The original post shows it in red and white; here’s the free download, if you want it:

Pinwheel Quilt_OPQuilt Download

I also had a request for a really oldie-but-goodie quilt (original post)(original post in green), so I drew up a pay-what-you-want-but-free-is-okay download for that. It’s in my pattern shop.

One last photo of France’s rapeseed fields and I’m off: