Santa’s Night Ride • Quilt Finish

November 26, 2023August 30, 2025 Elizabeth E.14 Comments

This quilt has been on quite a ride. A Santa’s Night Ride, to be exact.

It has flown over to France, to the QuiltMania people, who publish three fine magazines: QuiltMania, Simply Moderne and Simply Vintage.

It has flown home.

And it will be making its debut in one of the QuiltMania magazines: Simply Vintage!

I know my friend Carol will like the Corgi on the bed. I do too! My quilt, Santa’s Night Ride will be in this issue, Number #49, which should be out about now. For those of you not aware of the THREE Mania magazines, let me introduce you to this one. While it says “Vintage” on the top, you might instead think of it as more traditional than vintage. It has a lot of our favorite quilt designs, as well as some new ones. I’m just pleased as punch to have my quilt published, and you can buy it from them directly here. Just click on the newest issue, with the Corgi on the front.

The center blocks are Foundation Paper Pieced (FPP) and they go together quickly.

I also made the border with FPP, and here you see my favorite roller. Instead of running to the ironing board, just use this tool, an automotive tool, with ball bearings — I prefer it to the old wooden one I used to use, and it’s $cheaper$.

I always print out a light version of my quilt and map out my quilting. Then I will often use a disappearing pen to transfer my ideas to the quilt.

I even sewed on the binding by machine. It seems like every December, when I’m deep in the Christmas season, I get the bug to make a quilt, but I always finish it up in January. Not this one! This is Quilt #272 in my Quilt Index.

Some tips on using scraps: Keep them in similar values for the center blocks. All my blocks are different, but they “read” the same because I used the same red/white for the inner triangles, and while I used four different greens for the large triangles, they are distributed evenly throughout each block.

Go for one fabric for the light background for both the center blocks and the outside little tree-triangles in the border, as it helps tie the quilt together. You can see above all the different fabrics I used in the outer tree-triangles: cut loose and cut from your scraps.

This has been in the works for nearly a year, so while you may have had a glimpse or two of this small quilt, I was waiting for the day when I could share the happy news, of this publication.

Happy almost December!

Other QM published quilts:
Riverside Sawtooth (in QuiltMania)
Elizabeth’s Lollipops (in QuiltMania: a photograph from a quilt show, but I’m counting it!)
Crossroads (in Simply Moderne)

During the pandemic, I agreed to let them share my blocks with readers of the QuiltMania newsletter. The patterns have now come home to stay, and most are free (see tab, above).

300 Quilts · Mystery Quilt · Something to Think About

A Wild Night, A New Road • Quilt Finish

November 18, 2023August 31, 2025 Elizabeth E.25 Comments

Emily Dickinson’s phrase, Dying is a Wild Night and a New Road, accompanies me at times in my life. Dickinson first said it in a letter: “I know there is no pang like that for those we love, nor any leisure like the one they leave so closed behind them, but Dying is a wild Night and a new Road.” This past year, I said this phrase to my father, as we sat in the living room of where he lived with mother, who was on her own New Road that week. Life felt like a total slog in those early weeks after we lost her. I tried to get it together, but I felt so strange. Many of you wrote notes, send letters, welcoming me into this new club, and reminded me to give it time.

After a soggy winter and spring, this summer I let myself be pulled into this. I had no idea what it was going to be, or what kind of work it was. Yes, time does heal all wounds, but perhaps a little quilting wouldn’t hurt, either.

The first thing was to watch a video on how to choose fabrics, which was a great video. I could do this new thing. And when the first steps were to cut strips and sew them together, yeah — I was totally in.

Week by week, I cut and sewed and soon my file of print-outs and blocks was full:

It was like I was back in school, in a good way. In school, there’s always a syllabus, a raft of homework, a goal, a test, a completion. Working on this quilt I felt like I was accomplished something that wasn’t a duty. During this time I was getting quilts finished, but usually I have a lot of ideas and sparkles of creativity and things I want to say, but…it not this year. We had our kitchen torn apart, and then rebuilt. It was actually a relief to choose doorknobs, tile and countertop: a welcome distraction.

This article helped a lot with the sadness, letting me know that what I was going through was normal, would take time. Talking to my husband, my sisters, daughter, friends and my family was a solace. It’s all normal, yes, normal, normal, normal…but I wanted my old normal back, of happily diving into color and cloth, of not missing someone terribly.

I began to screenshot memes on Instagram, like this one, or the one below:

I retreated from life for awhile, but kept working on this Summer Camp quilt. Weeks Ringle and Bill Kerr, of the Modern Quilt Studio (who were running the Sew-A-Long) held “campfire talks.” Sometimes goofy, but always authentic, warm and interesting, I would join them a day or two late, and read through the posted comments. This project became my through-line.

I ended up with 52 blocks ( photo 1) which when placed on the wall revealed themselves to be Not Enough (2) and so I chose some of my favorite prompts and made more (3). I couldn’t see how this would ever become anything but a mush of color and line, just like I couldn’t see how I would ever feel like a life without my mother was something I wanted to have. She died at age 94, on November 13, 2022, a year ago. I’d had her all my life. I burst into tears at odd moments.

Finally, the Summer Camp Quilt-A-Long project turned a corner. Now I had to make something of these small blocks. I chose this layout, It’s a variation of one of their variations, with some changes suggested by my husband.

I finished quilting it this month, and made this label.

On the anniversary of her death, my husband and I drove to Utah. We picked up my father and drove to the cemetery in Paradise, Utah to see her gravesite, to remember her. Dad’s very old, and I’d forgotten to bring lawn chairs, so we were there about 3 minutes, 20 seconds. No lie. After he got back in the car, I took a few photographs, feeling a bit strange having such a cheerful quilt in this setting. While we were driving there, my father kept saying little tidbits like, “When she was a senior in high school, she was the editor of both the newspaper and the yearbook.” And, “She lived with her grandmother for a year the year before that.”

When we drove along the road beside this reservoir, he said: “We came along this way some time ago, and got as far as this bridge before we had to turn back. It was under construction.” They’d driven up there nearly every Memorial Day — or as they called it, Decoration Day — to put flowers on the gravesites of all those who had gone before. It felt very circular this day, me with my quilt, thinking about my Mom, as she always thought of her mother, her grandmother and others before her.

Back home several days later, I threw the quilt in the wash, and of course, it changed as quilts do, becoming something soft and cuddly and maybe perfect for a baby blanket? In the end I didn’t put the label on. I’ll send it out in the world without its history, letting it find its own way and purpose. I’m grateful for projects like this which are small bites at a time, helping me become reacquainted with why I like cloth and thread and quilts. I can’t always put my finger on where I am on this new road, but I feel better. I doodled a new design last night and I’m looking forward to making it.

My mother taught me to sew, first doll clothes, then enrolled me in a class at school where I made my first dress. Recently, I’ve had a couple of moments of deep remembrance, times when her presence has popped into my life, seemingly a reminder that she lives on, and still loves her daughter, and her quilts.

Thanks, Mom, for everything.

Quilt #282 • 45″ wide by 60″ long

300 Quilts · Free Quilt Pattern · Gridsters

Ladies of the Canon • Quilt Finish

November 12, 2023August 31, 2025 Elizabeth E.9 Comments

I was in a quandary about what to name this quilt, having tried out multiple phrases. It was a quilt made up of blocks from my friends in The Gridster Bee, the penultimate year I ran the group.

Susan, one of my friends in the group, wrote to suggest I consider “Ladies of the canon? As in music – composition in which each successively entering voice presents the initial theme usually transformed in a strictly consistent way. (And there’s also that cool reference to Ladies of the Canyon by Joni Mitchell.).”

I’d played many a canon in my teenager years as I studied music (piano) and who of us can forget the Pachelbel Canon in D? As to the quilt, I’d asked each of the bee members to make a lady, and some made “representative” women, and some made self-portraits. I didn’t really specify which they were to do; it was fun to see what arrived in the mail. I dithered for a long time about whether or not I should create a pieced back (I didn’t), and whether or not I should quilt it myself (I didn’t). If I had waited for myself to do those last two things, the quilt would still be in pieces in my sewing room. I did have a few extra blocks, and I have plans for them, never fear. I so appreciate the women I sewed with over several years time. The Bee was fairly stable for a while, but always a few leaving and a few coming in.

When I finally did leave The Gridsters, Patti took it over and it is still going strong, with a new group of women. It’s fun to see their blocks in my IG feed, and I’m happy for the time when I gathered my own Ladies of the Canon. Good memories, represented in this fun quilt.

I made my sample lady in February of 2021, using blue scraps from my first pieced quilt for her hat.

We photographed the quilt at a local elementary school. My husband catalogues all the murals and art in our town on his blog, Murals and Art, so I have an easy supply of cool backdrops.

Thanks, Dave, for always being willing to hold up a quilt. (BTW, those palm trees are not curved; it’s a function of the camera lenses.) This is quilt #280, in my Quilt Index.

Now, a piece of good news. My quilt, Aerial Beacon, was accepted into Road to California’s quilt exhibit in 2024. I didn’t think any of my quilts would be accepted, so yes, I’m pretty happy.

For a long time now, my husband and I knew of an actual aerial beacon in Southern Utah, but just could never find the time/energy to go there. This week, we did. I wrote about this, and the quilt, in an earlier post:

An arrow, about 50 feet long was poured from cement, and a tower and a small hut were erected on that slab. And we hiked up this hill to go and find one, in St. George, Utah:

You can still see the metal bars poking out of the center section, where the tower would go. This arrow is 56 feet in length.

Found out this is the remnant of Transcontinental Air Mail Route Beacon 37A (from here. More info is found here.)

We’re happy we found it! (I love I could connect with something created in 1925.)

The two white water tanks are to the left of this.

And that’s a good note on which to close this post. Happy November, everyone!

A Pattern Language

November 1, 2023August 31, 2025 Elizabeth E.13 Comments

“Every society which is alive and whole, will have its own unique and distinct pattern language; and further, that every individual in such a society will have a unique language, shared in part, but which as a totality is unique to the mind of the person who has it. In this sense, in a healthy society there will be as many pattern languages as there are people–even though these languages are shared and similar.

“…patterns are very much alive and evolving.”

from A Pattern Language, by Christopher Alexander, et al.

Santo Stefano, Bologna, Italy — dating back to the 5th century

I’ve been in another’s society’s pattern and language for the past week, and every day I felt as if there were a little pop! in the brain when I’d see something familiar…but not quite knowable. When the brick above resembled what I know as quilt block shapes, but I’m guessing the people of Italy didn’t have quilts like the ones we make in the fifth century. So what were these?

This sidewalk pattern reminded me of what Yvonne has done in her recent quilt. I was reading her posts on Instagram and every day I’d think of her as I walked by this pattern.

I definitely recognize the hexie-flower pattern, seen on a shop floor.

So recognizable, but with a twist of unfamiliarity. Here’s a 4-inch version of the center block, called Arrowhead:

Arrowhead 4″ templates Download

It wasn’t until it rained (darker area) that this tile underfoot because interesting. When wet, it looks like seed stitch punctuated by French knots.

I definitely recognize the chick wearing the spool of thread. Now these things are definitely in my territory.

Would we ever see a thimble and spool of thread in a high-end, fancy-schmancy store on a swanky retail avenue? Not likely. But here they honor the “art of craftsmanship,” and yes, I know, that referring to quilting as a craft can be a nails-on-the-chalkboard experience for some. But here, when it’s related to way-pricey bespoke shoes, I’m okay with the connection.

So the cream of all patterns — when in Florence — has to be in the Piazza del Duomo, with its cathedral, baptistry (front left) and bell tower (right). I wanted to take photos of every band, every design. I was in pattern heaven:

It also helps that we were waiting in line, held captive by the tourist experience, so I had the chance to study the designs a lot.

If I turn this screen pattern on a diagonal, it resembles the quilting pattern I chose for my new Christmas quilt.

If you have ever traveled to a pattern-rich place, do you do the same thing that I do? Try to figure out what patterns are workable, and which ones you could cart back in your memory or camera to try to spark what you are working on?

Or do you just let things empty out of your brain, letting things fall out and leaving them behind at home, and then slowly allow what you see to filter in? I’ve done it both ways, notebooks filled with sketches and cameras filled with snapshots. Some become quilts:

from the tiles of one of Gaudi’s houses in Barcelona, to my quilt Annularity.

While other things I see are just parked in the brain somewhere. (Do those side guards look like rabbits to you?)

The first thing I bring home with me is a way of cooking, like this bruschetta. It was not on the menu at the local trattoria, but we saw it served when the local postman sat down at the table next to us. The next day, my husband ordered it for lunch. Now you can bet I’m trying to find a good focaccia recipe. I have already purchased the tomatoes. And when my jet lag eases up, I’ll be in business.

Given my experiences with the moon lately, I so want to do something with these ideas that made my brain pop a little bit. Maybe that family who designed a crest also had an affinity with the heavens?

So welcome home to me, with a brain full of patterns, ideas, new sights, jet lag (which makes this post drift a little), food ideas, and hunger for Bologna’s own Majani chocolate. I’m sad to leave Florence and Bologna behind, yet happy to be back in my own bed, in my own place, back to my own pattern language.