Weekly update: design twice, sew once; a vintage gift; and reading

This afternoon was our first forest preserve/beach walk in weeks.    I stayed on the shore and zoomed in to get the ice photos.  It's dangerous to walk out on the pack ice.  (Upper right: a fallen tree encased in ice.)  

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"Design twice, sew once" is the corollary to the better-known "measure twice, cut once."  I changed the inner pink border fabric for another pink print AFTER I had the middle round of pinwheels sewn on.  Ripping and re-piecing took an evening (punctuated by the Olympics).  This photo shows the final borders sewn to the sides.  The top border is pinned to the design wall. The bottom border isn't there yet.

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"This box was in my grandmother's attic," Margaret said when she gave it to me at the Lake County Women's Coalition board meeting Saturday morning.  "We don't know who made them.  They're yours!"   I exercised great restraint and only peeked inside the box before the meeting began.  Once I got home I opened it up. 

Wow! Nearly all of the blocks appear to be 19th century. Hand-pieced and starched once upon a time. 

114 Ohio Star variation (Aunt Eliza's Star?).    8".  The hourglasses surround a center square. 

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53 11" Album blocks.  

Three of the blocks had inked-on signatures.

This is a slip of paper basted to the block. Note the old German script with long s's.   I haven't looked the names up on Ancestry yet. 

Some delicious prints!

Miscellaneous blocks. (Just one Rolling Stone.)  

Obviously newer fabric. Machine-pieced. The peach roses on teal would be a great retro/contemporary print.

What will I do with these?  I think I'm going to hand-wash them to get the starch out. Then I'll just enjoy owning them for a while. 

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Fiona Davis brings another New York landmark to life.                                                                                                                                       Manhattan, 1919: Lillian Carter is pseudonymously famous as Angelica, the model for architectural sculptures and statues that grace New York buildings. When her mother died she lost her guardian and her agent and was on the brink of poverty. She unexpectedly found employment as the personal secretary to Helen Frick, daughter of industrial magnate and art collector Henry Clay Frick, and went to live in the palatial Frick Mansion on E. 70th St. The family dysfunction becomes apparent -- Helen's eccentricities, Henry's tyranny and ill health, Mrs. Frick's withdrawal to avoid any conflict -- and the servants take sides.

January, 1966: the Frick Mansion is now a world-famous art museum. Veronica is an 18-year-old aspiring model in the city on her first photo shoot for Vogue. She gets separated from the other models when a huge blizzard hits the city. She is trapped inside the Frick. Fortunately there is one other person stuck there--Joshua is an intern working on the Frick family papers. They set out to solve clues that lead to a treasure hidden since Lillian's time.

Of the parallel storylines, I think the 1919 one is more convincing. (But I wonder: is the name Lillian Carter intentional? (Jimmy Carter's mother.)) 

A charming story of the Blitz told with wry humor and a few surprises.

Ten-year-old Noel Bostock has lived a rich, albeit unconventional, life with his guardian Mattie, a fiercely independent former suffragist. When Mattie develops dementia and can no longer care for Noel it looks as though he will become the ward of Mattie's godson and his wife, who are wrapped up in one another and cannot abide Noel. As WWII begins and London is threatened Noel becomes one of the  children evacuated from the city to the relative safety of the exurbs.

Vera "Vee" Sedge takes Noel, not out of any generosity but because she wants the stipend that comes with the boy. Vee is always on the edge of insolvency.  She makes amends for her past decisions by overindulging her semi-invalid mother and her supremely hapless adult son. Noel is brighter and better-read than anyone in the household. Vee and Noel form a tenuous bond as they concoct a scheme to get money (Vee) and to remember Mattie (Noel). They cross paths with some nasty people, get caught in an air raid -- and find that they can become a family of two.

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Linking up with Oh Scrap!    Monday Making   Design Wall Monday