Quilts

Halloween Banner

October 5, 2019October 2, 2019 Elizabeth E.14 Comments

My niece-by-marriage, Stephanie, has decked out her house with spiders everywhere, along with Halloween decor. She is a young mother with small children. I, however, drape one thing around the house and call it done. I am an old mother whose children have grown and gone, and there are no grandchildren around to witness my pathetic Halloween decorationing.

I started this in August, hoping to have it finished by October 1st. I finished it last Monday, so just barely by the beginning of Halloween Month.

In the other post, you can read about how I put the striped fabric on the edges. To finish it off, I cut five 1-1/2″ WOF strips of spooky fabric, and used a bias seam to join them all together. Then I arranged my pennants how I liked the order, and sewed the binding right-sides-together, overlapping the corners of the pennants slightly, and sewed it on.

I decided to slip in some really narrow cording (used for pulling up blinds; you can find it at your local all-purpose fabric store) in the black binding, in order to strengthen it and so it wouldn’t stretch out.

I folded the binding up and over the pennants, and pinned the edge. It gaped slightly, so I used a stiletto to help coax the folded edge over.

Really, it’s a clay MudTool, specifically a Mudshark. I saw it last week when we were in DC at Michael Sherrill’s exhibit. I like how the needle tool folds up into the Mudshark: no stiletto caps to lose. Who says museum gift shops don’t have items for quilters? You just have to think creatively.

P.S. I decided to mail it home via USPS because I didn’t know if it would clear airport security.

You can see the backing fabric here, also by J. Wecker Frisch. I left a tail of about 14″ and also added a loop of fabric (cut 5″ long) so I could tie it up somewhere, and call our house decorated.

If I can find the box in the garage, I also have some spooky crows that will work with this scene (more importantly: IF I feel like getting it all out). Maybe if I stocked in the Halloween Candy early, I’d get into the season?

Maybe.

Below is a link to a video clip of Michael Sherrill talking about his work. I found all the videos in the exhibit fascinating, as he is an artist who is also articulate, and can talk about the creative process.

Link to video.

Revisiting the Red and White Pinwheel

October 2, 2019December 1, 2024 Elizabeth E.12 Comments

Interestingly, I get a lot of mail about this quilt. It must be on a boatload of Pinterest boards, but the pattern for this quilt has gone missing. It was originally published in a national magazine, but in searching for it (my old link to the pattern is kaput), it seems to have disappeared. The original was in a lot of different colors, but my friend Rhonda chose to make it in red and white for a class she was teaching seven years ago. I liked hers so well, I made one of my own. The original pattern was an 8″ block, but I made the pattern to finish at 7 1/2″ (mostly so I could get it all on one page).

Since it’s not my pattern, and it’s disappeared and I get a lot of mail about it, I decided to draw it up in my QuiltPro software, rework it in Affinity Publisher software, and have it here for you for download:

Red & White Pinwheel_OPQuilt

It’s not really a pattern, but more a loose set of instructions. It’s meant to be a scrappy quilt, but I did include a yardage chart if you are using three reds, and a white.

You can read more about it here and here.

So you don’t go away empty-handed, if you’re not interested in a two-color quilt, here’s a chart that came to me in a Guild newsletter. It shows how much yardage is in a particular precut, and what that costs per yard.

Happy Quilting!

EPP · Guild Visits · Quilts · Travels

Do You Tweet?

September 29, 2019September 27, 2019 Elizabeth E.14 Comments

Tweet Ladybird

Tweet Shine Tweet Crossroads

Perhaps the UCR Science News was looking for something other than Nobel-prize generating stories or research about saving the world from cancer, but I’m happy that the editor liked my quilts, sent to him by my favorite guy (my husband). The quilts were displayed around University of California’s campus near some of the science buildings (and in the Botannic Garden). Thank you!

DAR Library.jpg

In other news, we visited the (tiny) exhibit at the DAR museum this past week (their library, above) in Washington, DC.

DAR exhibit sign.jpg

More on the exhibit in another post, but I met three quilters while I was there:

From the top left: Beth, a long-time friend (we always meet together at this particular science meeting of our husbands), Rhonda (who I met when I lived in D.C at the local quilt guild), and Bette (who I met online and since have become good friend with via correspondence and phone calls and occasional meetings). But that’s not all the news.

National Press Club

I spoke at the National Press Club, after I was proclaimed Queen of England.
Full story, below.

Headline Queen Elizabeth

Kidding, of course. I merely posed, and the other photo is a leather-embossed rendition of a famous headline, one in a row of famous headlines.

Climate Change Protest

We’d done most of the museums in December when we last visited, and I was wondering what to do one day when the Climate Change Activists staged one of their protests right outside my hotel. I threw on my clothes and went down to watch. I remember how the police used to break up other protests long ago, with tear gas and heavy-handedness. This experience was more like a garden party, as slowly, they encircled the boat parked in the middle of 16th and K. While the activists moved on to march around D.C. the police cut the handcuffs and tethers of those who remained, then towed away the boat. I was quite impressed with the whole experience, both of those who felt strongly about making a statement, and the police officers taking good care of those who they serve. Another reason why I love D.C.

Okay, I promise more serious quilty stuff soon. I’m coming home tonight from my niece’s wedding in the Bay Area, hoping to dive into what I’ve left undone while traveling. Before I left, I did get one quilt to the quilter’s, after auditioning, digitally, many different designs for quilting.

North Country Sept 2019 I also cut more pieces to keep going on my North Country Patchwork Quilt, eeking this one out, bit by bit (photo of what I have so far, above).

Temperature Quilt Sept19.jpg

I did get caught up with my temperature quilt, which is turning out to be very different colors than what I expected. I find it’s easier to do a whole month at a time, than piece-mealing it, day by day.

IE Modern Quilt Guild.jpg

Lastly, this coming Saturday, October 5th, I’ll be presenting a (mostly) modern quilt program at the Inland Empire Modern Quilt Guild in Riverside, California. They are a small modern guild, with a whole group of interested, dedicated quilters. Maybe you’ll be there?

Guild Visits · Quilts

Antelope Valley Quilt Association Visit • September 2019

September 20, 2019September 20, 2019 Elizabeth E.4 Comments

Antelope ValleyQA

AVQA_Meeting1

I drove up to Antelope Valley, nearly two hours away from my home, and joined the ladies at a local church for their monthly meeting (shown here during their break).

AVQA_Meeting3

It is in capable hands under their president Kathy (shown on the left), along with their two Program Chairs, Pat and Nette, as they showed off the results of their last workshop: Mondo Bags.

AVQA_Meeting4 AVQA_Meeting5

They had many Show and Share quilts, but I only show a couple. One exciting thing for their Guild is that a local art gallery will be hosing a show of their work, called 3 Layers.

AVQA_Meeting2

This a great opportunity for them to have a challenge and then a place to display those challenges.

The program chairs and guild departments were busy before the meeting and then during the break: the snacks line had both goodies and healthy treats for their members.

AVQA_Friday6

Because the Guild is so far away, they allowed me to stay over a night, so I visited their local quilt shop: Bolts in the Bathtub, picking up a few treasures and chatting with the woman who helped me, allowing me to get a sense of what challenges their community of quilters face.

AVQA Workshop Montage

Saturday, we all started early with the all-day Free Motion Quilting Workshop. I didn’t grab everyone’s photo, but the missing ones are in the group photo in the lower right. They were an enthusiastic group, ready to tackle their quilting sandwiches with stitches. I thoroughly enjoyed meeting the quilters of the Antelope Valley!