My first quilt

Carrie and Camille have issued a challenge on their blogs—to show a photograph of your first quilt and your most recently finished quilt. I’ve enjoyed the stories I’ve read so far and want to offer my own story.

The story of my first quilt is similar to that of Laurie Simpson. My mother and my Aunt Mary were both excellent seamstresses, especially my Aunt Mary. I loved to go fabric shopping with them and would consistently beg them to buy me the little bags of scraps that I would use to sew doll clothes. But neither my mother nor my Aunt Mary made quilts. I didn’t know of anyone in my family who made quilts.

I was about 14 or 15 when I saw a quilt project in Seventeen magazine and fell in love with it. I was surprised to see a quilting project in Seventeen, which usually focused on fashion and hair and makeup. The quilt featured an appliqué block in a star setting. I thought it was beautiful, but my mother said she didn’t like appliqué (I’m not sure she had done much appliqué previously, but if she had it had been a bad experience) so I started drawing designs for embroidered blocks instead. By that time I had been embroidering for about 9 years and it was my favorite hobby.

We didn’t have much money and I really wanted the quilt to be like the one in the picture—which was in three colors—and not scrappy. I kept pestering my mom to get the fabric and while I was waiting I thought about color schemes. When she was finally ready to buy fabric I had decided on the color scheme I wanted—cobalt blue, apple green, and taxicab yellow. I even painted my bedroom furniture the same colors to match. This is the quilt.


Although my mom had never quilted, she attacked the project with her usual enthusiasm and determination and learned everything she could about it. She helped me cut the pieces with scissors. I wish she had been around long enough for me to show her rotary cutting. I’m sure she would have loved it.

She taught me how to sew the blocks together. And there was no question that points would match. One of the best things my parents taught me was to do something right the first time. And one of the worst things they taught me is to do something right the first time because if it isn’t right I will rip out the work and start over. That’s one of the reasons it takes me so long to finish projects.

I worked on embroidering the blocks over the next several years. The designs started out simple.


But became more complex.

And even more complex.


I finally finished all the blocks and we began assembling the quilt. Then we started tying it. But it wasn’t quite finished when I graduated from college and was ready to move up to Bellingham for my first job. My parents helped me move and my mom had a surprise for me--she had finished the quilt by tying it with yellow thread. Notice there is no binding. It had been nine years since we started it.

I had this quilt on my bed for over 20 years, even though it was made for a twin bed and after college I had bigger beds. But finally I couldn’t take the colors anymore and it has been retired. The colors have faded and it needs some repairs to both the embroidery and the seams. But I will always love this quilt because I learned so much about quilting and I had the opportunity to work on it with my mom.

My most recently finished quilt is one I made for my nephew Tegan. This was a solo effort. I was inspired by the Simon the Puppy pattern.


I didn’t like the pointed head in the original and modified the pattern. After I started piecing the block I could see the advantage of having the pointed head—it was a challenge to match the points on the ears with the head. I also changed the sashing to one I thought was more appropriate for the reproduction 1930s fabrics. I quilted it myself by machine.


I have several WIPs that better illustrate my preferences in quilting, but both these quilts hold a special place in my heart.

This was great fun. And it got me to write another post. I look forward to reading stories from other quilters. Thanks Carrie and Camille for the inspiration!

Presto chango

My aunt Mary gave me this tablecloth. It was one of the first vintage tablecloths in my collection. At first I didn’t like it because of the colors—it is a very vintage palette with the red, greens, and gray.


But I love the strawberries and soon it became my favorite. I used it just about every night. And then, sadly, it started showing signs of wear.


I didn’t want to throw it away. So I started thinking about what I might do with it. I cut it in half, but I had no idea what to do next.

Then I got an idea. I decided to make an apron out of it. I’d never made an apron before. And I didn’t have a pattern. But I saw an apron at Anthropologie and took some measurements.

Most of the wear was on one-half of the tablecloth, so I cut around that half for the top and used the good half for the skirt. I didn’t want to cut the good half, so I used the entire half on the skirt.


I’m very happy with the result. The skirt is a bit blousy, but I like it. What made me very happy about this project is that this is the first time I have made something without a pattern. I feel inspired to do it again.


The model, by the way, is my niece Jessi, who agreed to model on one condition--that I not show her face. I mentioned the skirt was a bit blousy? No way I wanted to be in the photograph. I think the apron looks much nicer on Jessi's slender frame.

Starbucks oatmeal

I am ridiculously happy about having Starbucks oatmeal for breakfast at work this morning. I know that for the price of a Starbucks oatmeal I can buy a 12 bag box of instant oatmeal and bring it to work, but then I need to also bring in the brown sugar, nuts, cinnamon and milk. And I did try that, but it didn't taste as good as the Starbucks oatmeal. What can I say? When I buy the oatmeal at Starbucks they know that I like to have some steamed milk to add to it and they make me a small cup. And I can add the cinnamon while they are making me my grande latte. In these economic times I am trying to cut back on expenses. But I think I might just splurge on Friday and get Starbucks oatmeal. Because it tastes so good and it makes me ridiculously happy.

Yes we can, yes we did, yes we will

I am so incredibly happy and relieved that we elected Barack Obama as president. His message of hope, change, and unity are so needed right now. I remember when I first saw him speak at the 2004 Democratic National Convention. I wished then and there that I could vote for him for president instead of the uninspiring choice of John Kerry. I hadn't been that moved by a speech since I heard John F. Kennedy's speeches (replayed since I was too young to remember them live). I think this is an exciting time to be an American.

I am Elinor Dashwood

I am a huge Jane Austen fan. I have read several of her books and have seen several of the movies made from her books. My favorite Jane Austen adaptation is the BBC version of Pride and Prejudice. In my opinion, Colin Firth owns the role of Mr. Darcy. He is ever so attractive. If there isn't anything else interesting on television, my sister, niece and I will usually watch one of the many Jane Austen movies we own. We've seen them so many times we can quote the dialog. Sad, but true. So when I saw a link to the Which Austen Heroine Are You page I immediately followed it. And, as much as I would have liked to have been Elizabeth Bennett, I think that I am more like Elinor Dashwood.

Take the Quiz here!

Pat's Recipe Box

When I started this blog I intended to write on a regular basis. I don't think anyone would consider one blog in eight months to be regular, but it is what it is. I had no idea that it would take another blogger to inspire me to write again, but when I read Kay's blog about her Grandma Mabel's recipe box it brought back so many memories that I had to write about my mother's recipe box. This is my mother's recipe box.

My mother had this recipe box for as long as I can remember. I'm sure it is vintage 1960s. I never really liked the design but it was special because inside was all my mother's recipes. You can see how well used it was--as my dad would say it had a lot of miles on it.

Inside you can find the handwritten recipes with her scratchy writing, often with notes evaluating the recipe.

My mother was a good cook in a down home way. She was constantly looking for new recipes and would often modify the ones she found. Unfortunately, she did not always document the changes in her recipe box.

My mother's other source of recipes was her Betty Crocker cookbook. As you can see from the photo, this cookbook was also well-loved.

I love this cook book. I haven't been able to find a publishing date--some pages have fallen out. But mom cooked many excellent meals from recipes in this book. And this was the source for many of my first cooking successes, especially around the holiday. First it was the Spritz cookies and then the Basic Roll Dough, which both became a holiday favorite. After my mother died several years ago, I chose this cookbook and my sister chose the recipe box. 

A few years after my mother died my sister-in-law Holly, who had a lot of time but not much money to spend on Christmas, typed up all the recipes that my mother had made notations on in the cookbook and all the recipes in the box and gave each of us a copy of Pat's Family Recipes for Christmas.

It was a very generous gift, even if she did correct my mother's rather idiosyncratic spelling.

Here's my favorite recipe from my mother's cookbook--her recipe for pumpkin pie. Notice that she taped it to the introduction pages to the Pastry and pies section together with the recipe from the Libby's Pumpkin Pie recipe. You have to use both together because mom's version just includes measurements. She did provide the measurements for 2, 4, and 6 pies--there were 7 of us in the family and with us and all the other guests at Thanksgiving we needed several pies.

Here are the measurements for 2 pies:

1 can pumpkin

1 1/2 cup sugar

1 tsp salt

2 tsp cinnamon

1 tsp ginger

1/2 tsp nutmeg

1/2 tsp cloves

6 eggs

2 1/2 milk

1 1/3 cup canned milk

You will need to prepare the pie shells and heat the over to 425 degrees.

Beat the eggs lightly in a large bowl. Stir in remaining ingredients in order given. Pour the ingredients into pie shells.

Bake for 15 minutes at 425 degrees F. Reduce temperature to 350 degrees and bake for 40 to 50 minutes or until knife inserted in center comes out clean. Cool on wire rack.

I hope you enjoy this recipe as much as we all do. 

It begins

I've been thinking about writing a blog for some time now--ever since I discovered the Yarn Harlot and through her lots of other knitting bloggers. Quilt blogs seemed more difficult to find--at least ones that I found interesting. Then I found the Purl Bee blog. Both the Yarn Harlot and Purl Bee blog amused me and inspired me to try new projects. And to start my own blog. So, here I am. Starting one more thing. I'm great at starting things. I love the design process. I just get bogged down in the development phase. Will I continue? Who knows? My family thinks I am ADD when it comes to projects. My family would say I am an ADD blogger. That's how they describe me. They just change the activity. They've called me an ADD quilter, ADD knitter, ADD gardener. The list goes on. We'll see how it goes.

I have managed to finish a few things lately. Like the Flower Power Rag Time quilt for my niece Harper. That's her in the front and me in the back. Like you couldn't figure that out.
























The quilt was from a Moda kit. The fabric is a lovely brushed cotton. Yeah, I have mixed feelings about kits--I prefer to pick my own fabrics. But this kit was so charming and I thought it would be great for Harper because she loves bright colors and at the time it seemed like she needed a nice, soft cuddle quilt.

We won't talk about how long it took me to finish it. Part of the problem is that I decided to hand applique the flowers instead of using a quicker method. I hadn't seen a machine applique technique that I really liked and I didn't want to use an iron-on technique because the quilt would be for a child and would be washed a lot. I didn't want to take the chance that the flowers would curl up after awhile. And once I started the hand applique I didn't want to switch methods. So I took the long, slow road. The fabric was a pleasure to work with. And it was very satisfying to work with the big flowers. And big thread. Unlike some of my recent applique projects that involve very small pieces and silk thread. I loved the jumbo rick rack.
























So, that's one project down. We just won't talk about how many others are in the queue. After all, you don't even know me yet.