Keagan’s Quilt • Quilt Finish

July 10, 2021October 20, 2025 Elizabeth E.14 Comments

The year 1666 was the first recorded use of the word “minimal.” That was also the year, according to the Merriam-Webster Time Traveller feature, where the word “pandemic” was first turned up.

I looked it up because I was thinking about Minimalism — a word that showed up much later, in 1926 (the same year as estrogen, garlic salt, preemie and trick-or-treat) — and is defined as a style or technique (as in music, literature, or design) that is characterized by extreme spareness and simplicity.

[And speaking of words, did you know that “fewtrils” was one of the words in the final rounds of the recent Spelling Bee? It means things of little value and first showed up in 1750, the same year as frosting, steering wheel and unimportant. I totally have to use fewtrils again.] I digress, but be warned, I have the Spelling Bee on my mind today.

Modern quilters seem to love this style. Gimme a bunch of squares, a field of white and we are in business. So I was surprised to note that my granddaughter Keagan was also a lover of minimalism, when she asked me to make her a quilt for her queen-sized college bed. I found out from her mother that Keagan is also an avid follower of a famous trendy store, so I wasn’t too surprised when, as we began to trade photos of possible quilts, that this one showed up. I tracked the origins of this one using Google Photo search, and sure enough–it’s listed in that famous trendy store, is made in India, and is hand-stitched. We are all familiar with these quilts.

Keagan’s only requirement besides: minimalistic, gray with touches of forest green, and queen-sized, was “snuggly.” I sent the completed quilt top, with some cotton-wool batting (pre-washed) to Wolf Girl Quilts, and she sent it back a couple of days ago, all finished.

Since breaking my ankle, I’ve had a few more hours of down-time, and since my past self was very kind to my future self, I had the binding all cut out and ready to go. So I sewed it all down yesterday: broken/sprained ankle up on a camp stool on the left, while the right foot worked the sewing machine pedal on the right. Today we took it out for photos, with Dave moving around, me gimping around (no cast on the foot, yes, the referral and call are in to ortho, I just keep it elevated except when I’m out photographing quilts).

The back is all white: Painter’s Palette Solids. I ordered a whole bolt of that stuff.

We usually use a contraption of two clamps held out on sticks, but the sticks broke, so the quilt is in the washer (we kept meaning to put on sturdier sticks…). I’ll press it lightly, wrap it up and mail it off to one of my two granddaughters headed for college this year!

Keagan’s Quilt
Quilt No. 253
Began April 18, with designs showing how it will drape on the bed (below)
Finished July 9, 2021
89″ wide x 92″ long (approximate)

I worked it up in Affinity Designer. There is no pattern, but you can figure out the gist of it from what’s in the sketch above.

Apparently “snuggly” is not a word, but “snuggle” is. It showed up in 1687, along with birdhouse, trigonometric and yawner. I hope all these words haven’t been a real yawner for you, but just in case…I’ll stop this post here.

Happy Quilting!

300 Quilts · Free Quilt Pattern · Quilt Finish

Is a Tablerunner a Quilt?

May 30, 2021January 11, 2026 Elizabeth E.10 Comments

When you are stuck, it is. I love those houses, but…No.

New favorite. I ordered two more yards.

I love having scraps of batting that are just the right size.

Letting us both rest after a few hours of quilting.

Here come the beauty shots. (Isn’t that little bee with the branch arms the cutest?)

I quilted whatever came into my head.

I haven’t measured it, I haven’t labeled it, but the saga of the Orphan-Blocks-into-Table-Runner is now complete. I’m sorry to say, it didn’t empty out my orphan blocks bin much. Now I have to think up another way to use some of those up. And I have to think up a name. These orphan blocks came from when I taught the First Monday Sew-day class of beginners about Square-in-a-Square, or Economy blocks.

I still love these little houses. Now I have the beginning of another quilt! Get the Pattern Lite here.

Happy Memorial Day Weekend.

Or, as my mother would say, Happy Decoration Day (some fascinating reading in this link). The weekend before Memorial Day, my mother and father would go out and decorate the graves of their grandparents and great-grandparents with flowers, the cemetary made beautiful with pots of mums everywhere. This is the gravestone of my Scottish gr-grandmother. I have two namesake gr-grandmother Elizabeths and I remember them both on this Decoration Day. While the origins of Memorial Day are generally thought to be about the war dead, because of my mother, I remember it also as a day to honor those long gone.

I think we can do both.

In case you need to whip up a flag quilt, here’s a quick free tip sheet to do so!

Free Quilt Pattern · Gridsters · Something to Think About · This-and-That

This and That • May 2021

May 16, 2021October 20, 2025 Elizabeth E.8 Comments

This has been a busy week, with zooming and teaching at the Orange Grove Quilters Guild, but I’ve managed a few things around the edges.

This was April’s Gridster block, requested by Nancy. She sent out the blue fabric, and we chose the other, with her guidance.

This was May’s Gridsterbee block, chosen from my Sawtoothmania pattern by Allison. She also sent out fabric, but we provided the center color patches.

She had us do a wonky Christmas Tree. Allison asked for the one from another quilter, but I also have a free tutorial sheet on making little Christmas trees, too. Such a clever idea!

Teeny Christmas Tree quilt Download

My husband brings me flowers every day…well, photos of flowers. This one measures about 1 inch across in real life.

I finished Vesper Flights, and went on to this one: The Midnight Library. I listen to them at the same time my mother does, but this is one I wish I had in print, so I could underline things that caught my heart and imagination. Now I’m deep into Obama’s A Promised Land. It’s moved much faster now he’s been elected, and hearing about the 2008 economic meltdown, as well as the hog-trading of politics has been interesting. I am SURE I never want to be a politician. I’m sticking with quilting.

This is a close-up of one of the panels I used on my Wealth of Days quilt backing. I was stoked that it had our city on it. I tell most people, “we are between Palm Springs and LA,” but here we are!

Fabric receipts? Now the fabric just shows up in my mailbox, like magic, or something.

Occasionally, when writing this blog, or trying to color in a design, I can’t quite make the program give me the color I want (like this background). That’s when I turn to this no-frills site which shows a ton of colors with all their hexadecimal codes. I always start with the Blues page, which is what I’ve linked you to. I just copy the #code, pop it into my software or blogware, and I’m good to go.

I love following people who know what they are doing. I love reading their blog posts, their Instagram posts, and while I’m not a total fangirl of them all, I have several favorites (there are too many to list here; see my list at the bottom of my blog). I appreciate their sharing what they’ve discovered and learned. However, recently a famous maker of absolutely necessary quilting supplies popped the above Instagram ad up on my feed. (I’ve blocked out all the identifying marks to protect the marketing department.) She may be qualified, but is she an expert?

Shouldn’t she be referred to instead, more appropriately, as an Influencer?? I like Aurifil’s word for their influencers: “Ambassadors,” which my macaron-making daughter let me know, is also used in her industry. Rather than the previous ad campaigns of simple extolling of excellence of product, we now use people for that. (In my English classes of yore, this was a type of logical fallacy, using celebrities to sell products; however, we’ve morphed from random celebrities to using established personalities in the field to sell products.) Carolyn, a sewist/sewer who I’ve read for years, knows her stuff and has an excellent post on the rise of Influencers. I love this part of the post:

My criteria is based upon:
– Can they actually sew?
– Are they learning to better their craft?
– Do their garments fit well or are they just photographed well?
– Do they have any actual fabric knowledge or are they just taking stuff because it’s free?
– Do they understand why notions are important and why they’re needed to perform a task?
– Is all of their knowledge YouTube/Internet based or have they actually read a sewing book? Not all YouTube videos show you the correct techniques.
– Is this just a way to make them Social Media Famous?

A reminder for us creatives from Grant Snider

And lest you think I just sit around, I am working on a scrappy blues quilt, but it’s pretty shy right now and I just can’t coax it out from underneath the bed. I’ve even tried leaving spools of thread and colorful scraps to lure it into the daylight. Maybe later I can get a photo of it.

This is a quilt for a college-girl’s bed. My granddaughter shyly asked me last time I was at her house, “Grandma, will you make me a quilt for college?”

Me, inside:

Me, outside:
“Absolutely!”

We traded designs and pictures back and forth, but I quickly discovered that she is a minimalist, and likes gray. She knows I ~~hate~~ am not a fan of gray (generally), but she told her mother she thought I would come around after working on her quilt.

The red line in the drawing above is to approximate her queen-sized bed. I ordered yards of Painters Palette solids from Pineapple Threads, and they arrived last week. Between the shy scrappy blue quilt hiding out of sight, and this one, I’ll be keeping busy.

I can’t believe I signed up for this, but I swear it was because they come in cute little boxes. I do have some undressed pillow forms around her that need some clothes, and these seemed to call out to me (although if you know me, it won’t surprise you that I’ll be changing up some of the designs…looking at you Miss Christmas). But I’m excited to get a little fun package every month in the mail. (Guess this means I’m in covid-recovery–that I’m actually planning into the future.)

Lastly, I listened to/watched this show about the writer Amy Tan, called “Unintended Memoir.” It gave me so much to think about as I worked on the shy scrappy quilt, and now I want to go back and read her books again from her first, Joy Luck Club. She speaks movingly about her mother, and Tan chronicles their relationship as well as the writing of her novels. It lasts about 90 minutes; I recommend it.

Happy Quilting!

Free Quilt Pattern · Something to Think About · Tiny Quilts

Weary | Hopeful

November 26, 2020December 24, 2025 Elizabeth E.15 Comments

Blog-writing for other organizations can sometimes make me weary. I’ve been the blog-writer for a local guild here, and the other day — Blog Writing Day, as I like to call it, when everything stops and I won’t do one more thing before writing out the news and stuff for the organizaion — I sat at the computer, my mind blank. I wrote the usual paragraphs, then wondered if I should delete some of it, as I am turning everything over to a new person in a month, and would she want to have to write this in her tenure? It all became very complicated, trying to write what’s in someone else’s head, in someone else’s world.

When I write for this blog, on the other hand, I try to find some space and some quiet — a recent challenge during covid-time and we’re all shut in our houses together.

The conditions of these two aforementioned things may explain why you haven’t see a post from me in some time. But here goes.

Part of the title of this post, weary, might describe us all at this time. We’ve been covid-ing since March (wearying), made it mostly through an election (wearying), our energy levels are low, and now we are all putting up our Christmas lights early, trying to bring in some light into this weary world of ours. Ours went up last Saturday, and since we celebrated Thanksgiving early — a social distanced, outside on our patio, meal with local family this past Sunday — all our Christmas decor is creeping in to the house, well before the end of Thanksgiving Day.

It feels right. We need something to celebrate, to rejoice in, and I am looking to the familiar warm-hearted feelings that the Christmas season can bring, and if that means early tinsel and lights and nutcrackers, bring it on. If that means putting out the Christmas quilts, and pillows and table runners, I’m in. Christmas tunes? Now on the playlist.

I was trying to think of ways to help lift the weary and wondered if you were interested in a quilty make to up the holiday cheer. If so, here are two possible ways:

This is a teeny little quilt (4″ x 6″) that can be slipped over a frame. These make cute gifts for friends, for shut-ins, for people you visit but who are still fretting about their gain of the Covid-fifteen-so-no-more-chocolates-please. Directions are found *here.*

This is my field of Christmas trees, made so long ago from *this free tutorial* and which needs to be finished. What always stops me in a project is that I get plans which then complicates everything to that something perfect in my mind, which then shifts me to never-getting-it-finished. Keep in mind that just participating in the act of creation (like our quilts and blocks –and even wooden blocks on barns), can help us feel better about life.

Example of Complicated (work in progress):

Example of Uncomplicated:

Pumpkins quilt top, finished Tuesday night

Maybe December 2020 is the season for simple, for easy, for uncomplicated. Maybe it’s the time for bringing light, for sharing our lives, for writing holiday cards, letting people know we are still here. And next year, when we’re all vaccinated (my Christmas 2021 wish) and we’re out and about and full of vim and vigor and excitement, and even in spite of all the recovery work that will be around us, we’ll not be weary.

We’ll be hopeful.