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 · Patterns by Elizabeth of OPQuilt · Publications

Made to Withstand the Proof of Time

July 12, 2020July 13, 2020 Elizabeth E.23 Comments

As quilters, we have an relationship to time. We begin something, knowing it won’t be done for days, or months or even years. We work towards a daily or weekly goal of finishing the quilt, even though we might sometimes abandon the effort. But there is always this gap from beginning to end.

I started this quilt in December 2015, the design inspiration taken from an antique red and white quilt I’d seen in a quilt show. I couldn’t figure out how that quilting sister from 150 years ago put her quilt together, so I modernized it, and then in January 2016 sent the instructions to a bee I was in, asking them to make some blocks. Then I made more blocks, thinking about how that woman so long ago might envy our ability to have such an array of fabrics, to sew like the wind on our modern machines, to have such a distant circle of friends still gather together in a quilting bee.

I wrote about the finished quilt top, and then it sat. Time passed.

I wrote a pattern, but when QuiltMania accepted the quilt for publication, I took it down from my PayHip shop.

Time passed. And then some more time.

This week I received this picture in an email, along with the picture of the cover:

From December 2015 to August 2020 is nearly five years. In that time I’ve counted off changes in our family, health issues, deaths in our family, births and birthdays, personal highs, and personal challenges, a pandemic and now extremely grateful to have a quilt published in a respected quilt magazine. And to quote a common phrase seen in our quilty culture: I have #allthefeels.

Which brings me back to that photo at the top of this page. Several designers and architects were asked to “reflect on a changing world, their creative process, and the future of design.” I enjoyed reading their thoughts, as they echoed some of my own feelings about the creative life. Here’s two:

Pierre Yovanovitch (Provence, France) said: “I try to look at the silver lining and see this as an opportunity for a creative reset, taking a pause from our overly scheduled lives to tap back into what inspires us.”

Milanese designers Laura Sartori Rimini and Roberto Peregalli, who designed the room of plates at the top of the post:

“Regarding the future effects of this pandemic, on one hand it has been recognized the importance of the house as a center, a place of the soul in people’s life. On the other hand, the inevitable economic impact that will follow this situation will, we hope, generate among people the idea that the house isn’t just an object that follows the trends to be discarded and replaced for the next upcoming thing. You should aim for an object of beauty, made to withstand the proof of time.”

I guess that’s why we quilters are willing to start a quilt in December and nearly five years later, see it completed. That’s why we pick out fabrics and squirrel them away, knowing that sometime in the future — maybe even in a pandemic — we will pull out the projects we’ve collected and start the long process in the midst of the distraction, the sorrow, the uncertainty.

And as always, we will send our quilt out into the world as a veritable declaration of hope, our handiwork created to withstand the proof of time.

Happy quilting. Yes, especially now.

Publications

Crossroads & Simply Moderne Magazine

September 15, 2019January 11, 2026 Elizabeth E.20 Comments

Crossroads began in a mix of bright violet, purple, sailor blue, deep aqua, with some bright green, yellow and a touch of black. In other words, this quilt began like so many of mine do: in a swirl of color. But what happened next was quite an adventure.

The inception of the quilt came from two other versions, but I wanted to put this design through its paces and see what else it could do.

I cut and built the quilt, color band by color band.

Then I started quilting it a little over a year ago.

There were a few troubles here and there, with some healthy doses of unpicking.

But I finished quilting and moved onto the binding. So far, it all sounds pretty normal, right?

Time for some beauty shots in our university’s garden. Then I contacted Simply Moderne magazine, and asked if they were interested. I waited.

I taught a class with it.

Simply Moderne wrote back: yes! They were interested! (Cue jumping on the bed.) So the quilt went underground, as did the pattern. No more classes. No talking about it.

I dropped it off to them at Road to California January 2019, the folded quilt disguising my sling for my arm (rotator cuff surgery). This was on their IG feed.

This past week, September 2019, I received this in my email: the photo of my quilt, ready for publication. I was beyond thrilled, as I am a fervent and faithful reader of not only Simply Moderne, but also its parent magazine, QuiltMania. Everyone there at that publication is so very nice and lovely to work with.

So, pick it up at your newstand, or wait for your subscribed copy to be delivered, or order it online on the 19th of September. And give me a holler when you read it, for I’ll be waving back, jumping for joy!

Books · Quilts

Gridster Bee Blocks & Catch-Ups

October 27, 2017November 8, 2023 Elizabeth E.8 Comments

Simone, the Queen Bee for September, visited Grand Teton National Park over the summer and wanted a block to commemorate her visit. I can hardly wait to see this one.

Gridster_October African Queen Leisa’s mother used to live in Ghana, a missionary for the LDS church. While she was there, she sent Leisa a box of fabrics that she’s turned into African Queen blocks. In case you want one, here’s the info on the pattern by Anne Batiste.

I also saw Leisa’s block in my latest Quiltfolk Magazine, issue #4:

Quiltfolk Issue 4 Quiltfolk Issue 4a I have to admit, even though it’s a bit more than I’d usually pay for a single issue, I do enjoy this publication, as it generally focuses on the regular people of quilting, not the big Brand Names of Quilt Stardom. A nice change, which exposes me to a wider range of our quilt world (and lets me find an African Queen pattern!).

Here’s another I really enjoy–Uppercase Magazine. This issue hit it out of the park, in my view, so if you decide to subscribe, make sure you start with #35. Neither of these publications have advertisements, they are subscription based only, which is why they cost a bit more: the advertisers aren’t subsidizing the costs. I like advertisements okay; it helps me know what my favorite companies are doing. But I also like not having advertisements, too.

If you join up with Jeanine’s mailing list, she’ll give you a deal on a new subscription, plus you get her cool little missives. Never heavy, only intriguing and fun, filled with art and creativity everywhere. I’m sure you can sign up to get those all by themselves, if you want. (And no, Uppercase doesn’t pay me.)

Okay, as long as we are in the panting-over-something-but-don’t-know-if-I’ll-get-it phase, look what came in my mailbox this morning:

You get one box at a time, filled with stuff to make two Di Ford blocks. I’m not even a Di Ford aficionado (although you might persuade me) and I’m tempted. They are only making 400.

This news comes from someone who has the complete set of Frivols, yes, boxes 1-12. It was my retirement gift to myself. I still haven’t made ONE of those quilts, although I still like seeing the boxes. Soon.

My box fetish comes honestly from my mother, who always had a cupboard full of empty boxes for gift-giving, and a stack of them outside in the garage next to the freezer, just in case we needed one. I’m sure there are other box-hoarders out there, besides me, right?

Coming November 1st: my final quilt in the Four-in-Art experience. Although I’ll not be a part of it, the art quilt group still continues on, however, as Endeavourers, with Janine and Catherine at the helm.

They had such a nice response that their slots are full, but having run a few groups, I know that the line-ups change all the time. If you are interested in joining them, drop either one of them a note and ask to be added to their waiting list. It has been a wonderful experience to make art quilts these past five years, and being a part of a group is wonderful.

See you November 1st!