Frivols 10

October 1, 2018 Elizabeth E.5 Comments

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It’s the first week of October and has been my tradition this year, I announce the next Frivols I’ll be making for that month. (Only three more months to go.)

Titled The Cookie Exhange, box #10 inclues a Christmasy set of fabrics, recipe cards for the extra, a quote about cookies, and directions to a cute Bento-box type quilt called (what else?) “Sugar.” More info can be found on the Moda blog.

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I had put all of the Frivols tins in two cloth bags in my closet, and one-by-one I had been drawing them out to use. What a nice surprise it was to find extra fabric tucked in next to this box. See? I was being kind to my future self (for once).

AND, I’d like to announce the winner of the Paint by Numbers quilt book, a digital copy sent out by C & T books.

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Random Number Generator picked respondent #5, so congrats, Susan! I’ll be emailing you details for how to get your book.

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Thank you to all who entered, and happy sewing!

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All done with Frivols 9

September 20, 2018October 20, 2018 Elizabeth E.15 Comments

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Yippee! Number nine is finished, and in the same month I started it. We had to take my car in to get fixed (see recent post) and I thought taking photos at the auto body shop would be something different. I’m calling it Walk Around the Block.

First, a cool picture from @bymariandrew:

It’s been this way this month. I’ve kind been working all the time to finish up this and that.

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I’ve been helped by listening to this excellent book, Forty Autumns, by Nina Willmar, about one family separated by the Berlin Wall. I got down an old guidebook from the bookshelf in our family room, and sure enough, it shows the two Germanys, and the “island” of West Berlin. The Forty Autumns cover photo shows the Brandenburg Gate trapped in East Berlin, a fitting visual reminder of the difficulties of this time. I recommend it highly.

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The squares had no HSTs–hallelujah! so I whipped right through them, and the directions were easy to follow in both cutting and sewing. Frivols 9 _7

After switching the blocks around a bit, I found an arrangement I was happy with.

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Now to mark off the triangles to make the flying geese borders. I usually put on a gizmo on my sewing machine to make that sewing easier, but I was talking to my Mom, and it seemed a nice quiet way to keep my hands busy.

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And then, just like that, I had it quilted and done. I did loopies in the octagonal parts of the block, filling in with little petaled flowers. I kept the quilting to a minimum, so the quilt is soft. I always think there is a baby coming right around the corner who might need this.

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When I sewed on the the snowball squares, I did a double seam, so that I was — in the end — left with lots of little half-square triangles. There are four per block, and two per triangle in the border, so you can figure out how many I have.

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I’m now three-fourths of the way through, and I often wondered if I would make it this far. Thanks to all those supportive comments; I do appreciate them.

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A Stack of Frivols.
One is missing and is now the property of a wee girl named Halle.

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It’s been All Frivols, All the Time.

Now for a break!

Frivols 8 FINISHED! & Intro to Frivols 9

September 6, 2018September 6, 2018 Elizabeth E.15 Comments

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Frivols 8_7 front

I finished Frivols 8, and haven’t yet named it, although Moda calls it “Brio” or something like that. But all those Bear Paw blocks are so fun and alive, I need another name. How about…

Charlie and Bear Earmuffs

…Baby Bear?, especially after my daughter-in-law posted this picture of her youngest son (my youngest grandson) helping with dinner, complete with bear earmuffs. He’s a character.

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I finally was able to get to the quilting (see below).

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I found some old 1940s prints in the stash, and chose a blue to match the lightest blue in the quilt for the binding. That’s one of the troubles with doing these frivols after the fact: the fabrics to complete them are AWOL, but I made it work. Frivols 8_6

Now the requisite Beauty Shots. The print above is titled “She Will Find What Was Lost,” and is a print by Brian Kershisnik, a favorite of mine. Frivols 8_8a draped

But since this is your two-for-one post, here’s the intro for Frivols #9, our little box for September.

Look! No Half-Square Triangles! Okay, there are some triangles that are snowballed on, and a few Flying Geese, but hooray! I couldn’t face making another quilt with prints on a white background, even though I do like the look, so the background for this one will be a peach woven-looking print fabric.

This collection is by Lella Boutique. More info is found on Moda’s Blog.

And in other news this past while:

survived a “Meet N’Greet” when a young woman rear-ended me in stop-and-go traffic on the freeway. After spending too many hours on too many phone calls with her insurance company, I called mine, and the car will go in next week to be fixed. They’ll fight it out later who gets to pay what.
agonized when I discovered that all the patterns I’d given out in my workshop in August were too small. It was only after a phone call to corporate headquarters for the printing company, and two visits to the local outlet that I discovered what had happened: they had set the button to “Print to Fit” which ALL quilters know means at about 96%. They graciously printed out new, accurate copies, which I’ll collate and get over to the Guild. Then I’ll put a paper bag on my head and try to remain incognito.
created another tiny quilt in order to review a book by Kerry Foster, titled Paint-by-Numbers Quilting. My day on the Blog Hop is September 24th, and we’re doing a digital giveaway that day, so everyone can enter — US and international quilters. Check back then.
rearranged nearly everything upstairs in my house:We swapped the old guest room for the new office, which meant that all my stuff in the old guest room had to go in the hallways and the Master Bedroom, and the old office, and yes, even the bathtub. (I won’t show you the rest of the mess.)

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Lately, I wake up every day feeling like I have about 400 things to get done that day, and fall into bed exhausted, having only accomplished a few of the things on my list. I know this soon will end, once my home is back in order, the big projects finished, the trips taken, the car fixed, the weeds pulled, next month’s Frivols finished, and everything crossed off my To-Do list. Right.

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Frivols Quilts · Something to Think About

Frivols 8 • August 2018

August 1, 2018July 31, 2018 Elizabeth E.7 Comments

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September’s box is Frivols #8 and is a tin from American Jane, with a whole host of fancy and fun prints. The Moda blog notes that:

“There is a correction to the pattern – Background, Sashing, and Borders. The first line should say 3 – 5 1/2″ x width of fabric strips. From the strips, cut 18 – 5 1/2″ squares.”

Duly noted. I’ll figure it out when I get there.

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Here’s the layout of prints from their blog–colorful and charming. And I was happy to see that there are fewer half-square triangles in Sandy Klop’s quilt design.

The freebie for this Frivol is a sweet little tin with this month’s quilt design, that is just about the size of a charm square, perched up there by the bigger tin. I also love the quote on this month’s card: “Be yourself. Everyone else is already taken.” While it is attributed to Oscar Wilde, this attribution — as in so many other quote attributions — is a little squishy. For more discussion on this, visit the Quote Investigator. In fact, if you read this article, it seems like Wilde was a bit more pessimistic about this whole idea of authenticity:

It is tragic how few people ever “possess their souls” before they die. “Nothing is more rare in any man,” says Emerson, “than an act of his own.” It is quite true. Most people are other people. Their thoughts are some one else’s opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation. (c. 1900)

I happen to like the Thomas Merton version:

“In an age where there is much talk about “being yourself” I reserve to myself the right to forget about being myself, since in any case there is very little chance of my being anybody else. Rather it seems to me that when one is too intent on “being himself” he runs the risk of impersonating a shadow.” (c. 1967)

I have to say my favorite instance of this idea is from Gordon B. Hinckley, an earlier president of my church. He writes about discouragement when he was called on a church mission at age nineteen, feeling like he could never do what was required of him:

“I wrote a letter to my father and said, “I’m wasting my time and your money. I don’t see any point in my staying here.” And in due time a letter came back from him in which he simply said: “Dear Gordon. I have your letter of [such and such a date]. I have only one suggestion: Forget yourself and go to work. With love, your father.” [from here]

So often we can focus too much on ourselves, and how we feel from moment to moment. While this aesthetic — to “forget yourself and get to work” — seems to hail from another era, I like to think about it sometimes, when I often can’t find the energy to finish up the chore, to get the work done, to complete the task. I felt that way with Frivols #7, as you probably know. And somedays I have to ask myself: “What do I want to have done by the end of this day?”

Perhaps all this seems so far from the supposed Wilde quote of “being yourself,” but for me they are linked. Perhaps the work is me, the getting done is the shaping of who I am. And hopefully, in forgetting myself and getting to work, I will become my best self.

Frivols 8_ little tin