WIP

My Small World, redux

September 10, 2019May 20, 2026 Elizabeth E.11 Comments

It’s not often I get to have a re-do on Quilts-I-Once-Started-But-Abandoned, but there’s a fresh breeze in the air this fall, with another go-round of Jen Kingwell’s My Small World quilt. Paula James (@the_secret_sewer) and Nicola Kelly (@nicola_picola_) have joined forces under the IG banner of #mysmallworldsewcial on Instagram, getting us started and keeping us going until we all finish, some nine months later. The experts all say that we’ll agree to anything that has a finish date in the future because we think we have all the time in the world in the future. This proves it.

I love Paul’s opening line in her recent post: “Over 60 awesome quilting friends have foolishly offered to join Nicola and me in a special sewalong to create our very own #mysmallworldquilt by genius @jenkingwell.”

And Nicola writes: “The fabulous Paula and I were beyond inspired by Jen Kingwell’s #mysmallworldquilt at last weekend’s retreat that we decided to make one in our inimitable style! 😂. If you would like to join us in a friendly, motivational and slightly bonkers sew along we’d LOVE to have you onboard….Thank you for the phenomenal response already to Paula’s post last night and let me know below if you’ve reconsidered your WIP pile and fancy another little addition.”

These are my kind of leaders.

I dug in the boxes at the bottom of the heap, to drag out this woe-be-gotten piece of piecing, folded up some four years ago (that’s 1460 days, if you are counting) and set aside. The last post I can find says something like “My Small World, June 2015 edition,” like there was going to be something else after that.

I’d made a copy of the pattern from my Quilt Mania Special Issue Spring 2015 (which isn’t for sale anymore), and made all my errata and corrections on this, so I’m somewhat ahead of the game. I guess. And there was an earlier sew-a-long; see my Posts for Reference, below. The IG at that time was #mysmallworldqal and it can be helpful to look at that feed for ideas.

I also have a bazillion 1 1/2″ squares of ivory-colored sky cut up. When I saw this in a comment on the #mysmallworldsewcial feed, I had to laugh:

You can purchase the pattern at Jen Kingwell’s Shop, Amitie, if you want the booklet, but you can also find some online, if you do a search. So, get out your orphaned Small World and get back in the game!! Below are screenshots from their feed, reminding me of what I need to get done by what date:

Other Posts For Reference
VeryKerryBerry — Kerry ran an IG sew-a-long in 2015. On this post she has info about each section, links to Errata (Corrections) if you have the magazine pattern, and tips and tricks. Very helpful. [Warning: Any link back to QuiltMania does not work. I think after a year, they relinquish rights and responsibilities back to the pattern writer.]
Patchwork ‘n’ Play — Susan’s Melbourne Town, where I found out that Jen Kingwell based this quilt on the artwork of Mary Blair, a Disney artist.
Live A Colorful Life — Cindy’s My Small World: The Disney Version
Wendy’s Quilts and More — Wendy writes about re-starting a stalled Small World
Another post from Wendy with more tips

City Streets Pattern Release

September 7, 2019May 20, 2026 Elizabeth E.6 Comments

City Streets now has another rendition.

I made it up in a 15″ block pattern, and broke into my meager Tula stash to create a colorful quilt. This pattern is made for beginners, with no triangles anywhere. I envisioned the 15″ block to sew up quickly for baby quilts and other times when you need a quilt. Fast.

I cut and sewed this all in a long morning, which leaked a bit into the afternoon. It’s a pretty quick sew if you are experienced, but a bit longer if you are a newbie.

City Streets, with both sizes included, is now for sale on PayHip. (Get coupon, below.)

I also learned a few new things in my Affinity Publisher Software, making the pattern more colorful and easy-to-read. Above is the yardage chart for both versions.

You’ve seen a photo shoot on the first version of this quilt, but more pictures of the new version (not yet quilted) are below:

Here’s a coupon code for you in case you want to pick it up. Head over to PayHip and use CITYSTREETS20 — it will get you 20% off the price for a little more than a week (it expires on September 17th).

Happy Sewing!

300 Quilts · Patterns by Elizabeth of OPQuilt · Quilt Finish · Quilts

Betsy’s Creation • Quilt Finish

September 1, 2019January 11, 2026 Elizabeth E.19 Comments

I found this 1920s vintage park with a grandstand in a small town just to the north of me and took my husband and my most recent finished quilt there, so we could do some photographing. And some reminiscing.

It’s a sweet little small-town-built-long-ago park that for some miracle has remained. Named for an officer of the local cement company at the time, it’s known as the Thomas J. Fleming Memorial Park, built circa 1922-1925. Why is this important?

I grew up in a small little town (not so little anymore), but it had that feeling of walking downtown on a hot summer’s evening, catching the fireworks on the 4th of July after seeing the parade that morning. It had the feeling of being able to drop your school bag at the door, change in to your “play clothes,” and head over past the Muehlstein’s home to send this and that sailing down their irrigation canal until you knew it was time to go home for dinner. (And did I mention that my childhood nickname was Betsy?)

We’d walk up to Heber’s house and offer to find the eggs in his chicken coop for him. He’d let us. We would wind crepe paper in our bicycle spokes and all show up for a local parade. This was also a place where I was smallminded at times, like when I teased Marlene in fourth grade over something dumb, and then used up all her Scotch tape. It’s a place where others can also be mean, like when I got beat up by the Mitchell boy, and cried all the way home. (Later my mother saw him on the road, rolled down her car window and gave him a talking-to like I’d never heard.)

This small town in America was my place, where I learned to behave myself so no neighborhood mother would ever have to lean out her car window and give me a scolding. And how I wish I could go back in time and find Marlene and tell her how sorry I am. It was a place to be small, to grow up, and to leave behind.

But I catch glimpses of it when I think of it as a land of red, white and blue, where we love flags and fireworks and the Fourth of July. It’s a land of learning to get along with your neighbor because you never know when that person with the different name would give you a lifetime memory. Like when I needed to learn to ride a bike and Joan Muehlstein gripped the back of the seat, ran alongside me, and hollered, “Turn towards the wobble!”

It’s mountains and vast plains, it’s small towns and big cities. And America is where I like to be the most, even though now I’ve traveled and love Berlin and Bologna and other different places with wonderful people who’ve gone themselves through nice and mean, dark and light, thick and thin. It’s when I return from far away and see that flag on the wall at the airport with a sign that says “Welcome to the United States,” well, I get a misty-eyed, just like in those movies from the 1940s.

It’s my home, this America. And to me, it’s a pretty great place.

Betsy’s Creation • Quilt #225
Pieced by Elizabeth Eastmond • Quilted by Cathy Kreter
72″ wide x 86″ tall

Quilt began on Flag Day: June 14, 2019
Finished August 20, 2019
More info and a free worksheet for making this quilt can be found here. I also made a companion smaller flag:

etsycreation

Guild Visits · Quilts

Inland Empire Quilters Quild

August 27, 2019May 20, 2026 Elizabeth E.8 Comments

The classroom behind me was abuzz as I set up my Shine quilt on its frame. I turned around to see that the room had filled up with women from the Inland Empire Quilters Guild, who had come to take my class on English Paper-Piecing (EPP). I have many Guild visits coming in the next year, but only one group has chosen EPP. So I challenged myself to come up with something unusual and interesting that would provide a chance for them to learn a variety of skills.

EPP Picture 2 — IQSC Collection: Clyde E. and Joan B. Shorey Collection IQSC Object Number: 2006.056.0012

First I gave them a brief history of EPP, showing them quilt pictures from the International Quilt Museum in Lincoln, NE.

EPP Picture 1 — International Quilt Study Center, 2006.043.0143, Ardis and Robert James Collection

The International Quilt Museum calls these types of quilts “mosaic” patchwork quilts, and they write: “The earliest examples of mosaic patchwork, from 1700s England, were typically made from lighter-colored silks. Later, during the third quarter of the 1800s, dark-colored silks predominated. Their availability, and the paper-piecing technique, spread widely throughout the United States.”

The three tasks I designed for the Inland Empire Quilters were:

baste fabric to hexies and then sew them together
learn how to work with paper EPP patterns (batch-cutting, glueing and sewing)
work with color and value in creating Spectrum, a circular mini quilt

Sue worked diligently on her hexie flower, finishing it up. Most others shifted off to the mini-mini quilt: a Kansas Sunflower variation, shown at the top of this post.

I was impressed with their designs and the variety of colors they used.

After lunch, we shifted full gear into working on Spectrum, with collections of Kaffe Fasset fabrics being displayed on tables everywhere. I was most impressed with the generosity of these women, who shared different colors with each other, helping their fellow quilters get all the hues they needed.

At the end of class, Carol went down to the car and brought up this old EPP quilt, with the papers still in it. We pulled out a few stitches, removed a few papers and decided it was from the 1930s as the papers were really postcards from a Chicago hotel. What tales this quilt could tell!

Monday night, I returned to present a program for them, and at the beginning, those who had made progress on their projects held them up for everyone to see.

I snapped photos of some who came up to show me (including Vicki and Terri). That’s Cynna’s Spectrum color wheel taking shape, above left, and Paula’s Kansas Sunflower (variation) and small hexie quilt below left. I was very impressed with everyone’s work.

Susan, the Program Chair, was busy at her table, but she and others had worked hard to show their projects for the meeting. She has arranged a visit by a noted designer next year and was busy taking sign-ups for that workshop to be held in March. Program Chairs are critical to a Guild’s success, and this Guild has a wide array of interesting presentations for their members. They also have engaged chairs for Charity, Outreach, and other, but most of those are discussed at their other meeting (they have two per month). This month was also the kick-off for their Block of the Month, which looks really fun.

One of the best sounds ever is the cheery voice of quilters greeting each other, which you can hear in this video. I had a wonderful time visiting the Inland Empire Quilters Guild. Thank you for inviting me!