Frieda Anderson–Guest Blogger

 

Frieda Anderson is a friend of mine who’s Craftsy class just went LIVE!  She is one of the sweetest people I know and when our paths cross I love catching up with her in person.

So I asked her a few questions to introduce her to you and I highly recommend you check out her class!

My class is called Machine Quilting the Home Sweet Home Quilt. It is about overcoming the fear of free motion machine quilting. Learning 20 basic machine quilting designs and placing them on a project called the Home Sweet Home Quilt.

1. What year did you make your first quilt? Traditional or art

I made my first quilt when I was in high school. It was a 4” patch quilt made from dress scraps. I made it with my maternal grandmother. I can still remember cutting out the cardboard template and drawing around it with a pencil. I might even have hand stitched it together. I know we tied it when it was finished.

2. What is the first show, and year, that you ever entered your art quilts? Venue?

I entered Paducah I don’t remember the year but in was in the 1990’s. My first award was in 1992 for a miniature quilt. It was in a local show and it won a first place ribbon. I was beyond thrilled.

3. What is your artistic style?

I would say that my style is free form. I like nature, trees, leaves and flowers and much of my art revolves around those themes. I love saturated color and tend to use really deep hues in my work. I fell in love with hand dyeing fabric 20 some odd years ago and have been working with my own hand dyed fabrics ever since. HOWEVER that doesn't keep me from “collecting” other fabrics.

4. Have you ever changed your style from when you started making quilts? OH yes, I vacillate between fused art quilts and my own original pieced quilts. I like doing both. I’m a Gemini so of course there are two sides to the coin.

The reason that I made a pieced project for my machine quilting class is because I wanted a project that everyone could tackle. Not every quilter likes to make art quilts and I wanted to make sure that people who took the free motion machine quilting class would put all the designs that are offered in the class on a finished project so they would learn to handle working on a small quilt. Each area on the quilt has a design assigned to it. That took all the guess work out of the process, something people really fear.

I teach machine quilting all over the country and hear so many people tell me who scared they are of the process of machine quilting. I wanted to help them over come that fear and have a very manageable project to work on. The quilt in the Home Sweet Home class is 40” x 60” finished a good starting place to do free motion machine quilting.

 

CLICK ON HER CRAFTSY CLASS BANNER ABOVE TO GO RIGHT TO HER CLASS ON CRAFTSY!

You can sign up for a chance to win a free version of this class here.

German Chocolate GingerCrack Cookies

Spent some time in the kitchen yesterday fiddlin’ with my GingerCrack Cookie Recipe.

For those new to the blog, GingerCrack is the name of a semi homemade cookie recipe I made up a few years back.  Paul and Emily (and guests at Christmas break) could not get enough of the little cookies and dubbed them GingerCrack.

Here is the original recipe:

GingerCrack Cookies

1 package of Betty Crocker Gingerbread Cookie Mix

½ teaspoon of Ginger

½ teaspoon of Cinnamon

1 packet of Vanilla Sugar

½ teaspoon of Pumpkin Pie Spice

1 teaspoon of Nutmeg

Sprinkle cookies with Cinnamon Sugar before baking follow the baking temp and time on the cookie mix package.  Tweak to your liking.

 

I have been pushing around a half box of German Chocolate Cake Mix for a few weeks now in the kitchen.  We have taken to just backing 2-4 cupcakes here and there when the oven is on for something else so half boxes of cake mix are not uncommon.

I wanted that cake mix gone.

So I grabbed a bag of my beloved Betty Crocker Gingerbread Cookie Mix and started to play.

German Chocolate GingerCrack Cookies

1 package of Betty Crocker Gingerbread Cookie Mix

1 cup of Betty Crocker German Chocolate Cake Mix

3 tablespoons of water

1 egg

1 tablespoon Cinnamon Sugar

1 teaspoon Nutmeg

1 packet of Vanilla Sugar

 

I made small spoon size balls of cookie mix for bite size cookies. 375 degrees for 10 mins.

As you can see I left out the Ginger, Pumpkin Pie, Cinnamon (but added Cinnamon Sugar to the mix) as I wanted more of a Chocolate Cookie with a ginger twinkle.   I might put the Pumpkin Pie spice back in on the next batch to give it a bit more punch.

This is half the cookies the package made…the other half are waiting for guests….coffee’s on.

 

Things I never miss.

Yesterday I happened to enjoy two things I NEVER EVER miss.  So I thought I would share.

First.

MadMen. 

 

 

 

(NOTE I WILL NOT BE SPOILING ANYTHING>>>READ ON)

Absolutely never miss it. And by that I mean if I do miss an episode on Sunday night (rare) I watch it as quickly as possible on OnDemand before the next airs.  I never let myself fall away from Mad Men.  Even when some of the storylines frustrate me.  I hang in there.

I am thrilled that a long forgotten storyline was touched on in last night’s episode.   I was hoping it would be resurrected before the series end.  I would like closure. 

I am not one for seeing a movie twice let alone a TV episode.  I drives me crazy to “rewatch anything”.  But Mad Men will someday be an entire snowy weekend event where I plan to watch all episodes back to back to back.

The love of Mad Men is also shared by Emily.  In fact she is the reason I initially got hooked.  That first summer home from college she quickly caught me up on the series.  And then last summer she hooked me into Downton Abbey but that is another story. 

Thru the eyes of my daughter I see that this series opens up the discussion that many things in the world today are the same as it was 20 years ago when I was her age and even 40 years ago in the world of Man Men. 

Every generation likes to think the “times” are unique unto them.  But if we are honest.  It’s much the same just the wardrobe and music are different.  

Now onto my second never miss.

A new release book by Mary Kay Andrews.

 

 

The latest was released a mere 6 days ago and downloaded by 8am on release day to my Nook.  I held out for three days hoping to keep the book on my “to be read” shelf by June 18th when I hit the road again.   I failed.

496 pages later.

I finished it last night. 

A fun little chick read. 

 

 

Next up.

 

 

 

Revolutionary Summer by Joseph J. Ellis.

I like to mix it up like that.

 

What are some things you never miss?

 

 

 

 

Now two other things I am missing….Paul Jr. & Emily.

this may take awhile to get thru.

25 to Go!

Today I did a count and realized I am down to my last 25 copies of Garden Whimsy Applique.

This is my book that covers my method of machine applique and has 12 patterns in it.

They are marked down to $10 each (*plus shipping…your choice Priority Mail or Media Mail) on my website.

And of course I will autograph every last copy.

 

*foreign orders contact me for shipping costs.

Brews for Drew

 

I held off writing this blog until the kids were settled and life had slowed down just a tad for us.  Now both Paul and I are turning out free time to raising awareness to the fundraiser for his brother Drew that will happen on September 8th.

You can read all about Drew and his medical situation on this PDF that I posted on facebook about a week ago.

Already blocks are arriving and we cannot thank everyone enough for making a block and sending it.  It is going to be an awesome Scrappy Chicago Bears Trips Quilt!

I plan to put together the quilt the first week of July so if you could have your block to me by July 1st that would be great.

Bonnie Hunter has graciously allowed me to link to her tutorial here for easy peasy instructions to make a Scrappy Trip Around the World Block.

Thank you all for your support,

WOW It’s almost June!

Those are the words that I just spoke when talking to my pal Bonnie (yeah I’m name dropping…lol) regarding the

Celebration Collaboration Retreat

we are jointly teaching at this upcoming August in North Carolina. In order to get the early bird registration price your envelope needs to be postmarked by tomorrow June 1st!

You can find all the information here. 

 

 

This is a sample of the wall hanging project we are teaching.

A fun and scrappy pieced background that can be done in any color way that makes you smile taught by Bonnie.

I will be teaching a new Pieced Hexie pattern that won’t be available to the public until the release of my next book in early 2014.

The plan is to start off the retreat as a whole.

Break into two groups so that each can spend a whole day with Bonnie and I.   And we will all come together in the end to finish the project.

 

 

There are a few spaces left…..hope you can join us! 

Lots of fun and surprises planned.  

Laughter, friendship, a “fiber fix” and quilting are guaranteed!

 

 

 

 

 

In the meantime I am busy packing up the truck yet again for the third moving trip in as many weeks. 

 

This time It’s back to Arkansas with Emily as she has landed the position of Admissions Counselor for Hendrix College. 

Yep…this nest is officially empty come June 4th.

I’m just gonna quilt my brains out until I hit the road again 2 weeks later to keep from crying to much.

Enjoy the day,

Twin A’s Quilt

It looks like my camera problem has been solved with the “reset to factory settings correction” so I am blogging again. 

And just in time to share Pauli’s quilt before he flies the coop tomorrow to his new apartment and job in Madison Wisconsin.

He is going to be missed.  But at only 152 miles from our door to his I hope he will surprise us everyone in awhile and head here for an evening or two and some Rosie’s pizza. 

I got the binding on his quilt and it will be off with him in the morning. 

A simple quilt of Triple Nine Patch blocks.  Nothing fancy.  Just made with love.

I made both Paul and Em the same quilt but dramatically different colors.   I will have a blog on Em’s in a week or so.  The quilts are named Twin A and Twin B.  Their legal names for the first 4 days in the hospital until the birth ceritificate lady finally got to my room. 

The quilts aren’t big at 68 x 78 but they are good lap size.  I plan to make them each a queen size quilt now that I have a feel for their style and colors of their apartments.  Yes apartments…Em is out the door on Saturday to her new abode. 

 

 

 

I think Molly is going to miss Pauli.  She just loves jumping up and snuggling him when he is on the couch. 

 

 

 

I am so proud of Paul.  He is ready to take on the world.