Reverse Silk Circle

How to Be a Financial Failure – by life coach Kim Giles

1. Don’t invest in yourself. Don’t get a good education. Don’t read, take self-improvement courses, or learn what you can about your profession. Do the minimum to get by.

2. Spend everything you make. If you earn $25,000, spend $25,000. If you make $250,000, spend $250,000. You deserve to enjoy yourself now. The future will take care of itself.

3. Refuse to take responsibility for yourself. Blame your employer, the economy, or the high cost of living. Soon you’ll even begin to believe your excuses.

4. Wait for the best time to begin saving. When you’re in school, wait until you graduate. When you graduate, wait until you buy your first home. Before you know it you’ll be in your 50's with little or no money.

5. Ignore sound financial principles; gamble what little you have. Pay thousands for seminars where “experts” will teach you the secrets for building wealth. Never mind that one famous expert lost $800,000 trading stocks but made $110,000,000 teaching others to invest.

Yosegi Kaku to Sankaku (Squares and Triangles)

I’m sure you’re familiar with 7-Layer Salads. Here’s a tasty variation on that theme. It’s a big hit every time I make it:

English Seven-Layer Salad

4 peeled carrots, cut into julienne strips

1 small head of butter lettuce (Romaine is a good substitute.)

1 English cucumber, peeled, seeded and diced

1/2 cup frozen corn

2 cups small seashell pasta, cooked al dente (Not too soft!)

2 cups mayonnaise (It’s more work, but homemade is really the best.)

2 tablespoons dark brown sugar

1 tablespoon curry powder

1/2  teaspoon kosher (coarse) salt

1 clove garlic, finely minced

1 cup shredded white cheddar cheese

Layer the first six ingredients in a trifle bowl in the order listed, so carrots will be on the bottom and pasta on the top. In a small bowl, combine mayo and seasonings; spread carefully over pasta. Top with cheese and refrigerate, covered, for at least an hour to let the flavors blend.

Utah State Fair Quilt Challenge

Every year since 2007 the Utah State Fair has issued a challenge to use a particular fabric in a wall hanging quilt. I’ve submitted entries every year, and two have won blue ribbons. (For my UK friends, a blue ribbon in the US is a first place award. Red ribbons are for second place; the opposite of what you’re used to.) The quilts must be the work of one person, from the design and piecing of the top to the quilting and finish work. Making a challenge quilt every year has pushed me to improve my skills at those aspects of quilt making I would normally leave to someone else. The quilt pictured here was my entry for 2010. You can also see it at the far right of the photo below, from the archives of the Salt Lake Tribune. I’ll submit this year’s quilt next Thursday, and I’ll also post a photo of it here on that day. Wish me luck!

Hira Izutsu Ni Kugi (Flat Well Curb Nail)

Phyllis Diller passed away Monday, August 20. If you’re too young to remember her movies with Bob Hope (Boy Did I Get a Wrong Number, Eight on the Lamb, and The Private Life of Sgt. O’Farrell) you’ll still recognize her cackling voice as the ant queen in A Bug’s Life. In her honor, here are some of my favorite Phyllis Diller quotes:

Aim high, and you won’t shoot your foot off.

I want my children to have the things I couldn’t afford. Then I want to move in with them.

A bachelor is a guy who never made the same mistake once.

Be nice to your children. They’re the ones who will choose your rest home.

Most kids threaten at times to run away from home. This is the only thing that keeps some parents going.

Housework can’t kill you, but why take the chance?

Cleaning your house while the children are still growing is like shoveling the sidewalk while it’s still snowing.

Meisen Maru (Silk Circle)

Silk is amazing stuff. I read somewhere that the Chinese have been making silk for over 5,000 years. I have trouble imagining how the idea must first have occurred to them. To make silk, you have to kill the silkworm before it emerges from its cocoon. If you don’t, the worm chews a hole on the way out. Then you can’t unravel the cocoon in one continuous strand. Imported silk has been found with mummies entombed a thousand years before Christ walked the earth. During the 1800’s, when women in Great Britain and the United States wished to protest slavery, they wore silk instead of slave-produced cotton. I wonder if they had any idea (or even if they cared) whether the workers producing silk were treated ethically or not. The same question nags at me when I see goods for sale labeled “Free Trade.” How do I know my purchase will actually help the people who need it most?

Snail's Trail

Last autumn I made 17 blocks using the Benartex Bittersweet line by Nancy Halvorsen. Twelve blocks came from the 2011 Patchwork Party using Marti Michell’s L template set. The 5 extra blocks were also made with these templates, using scraps from the first 12. (You can see all of them by scrolling back through this blog to mid-October.) The 12 shops involved with last year’s Patchwork Party each offered a different setting for the finished blocks. I liked them, but the kits were a bit out of my price range. And with an overseas move coming up, I was reluctant to order. Without a definite plan for these lovely blocks, I’ve been waiting for inspiration to strike. Sunday I was rummaging through the scraps and a solution hit me. I only need a yard of the background fabric to make 18 Snail’s Trails to alternate with the blocks I have. Yesterday I found the background fabric on sale at half price. I wish all my problems were this easy to solve.

Paper Crane

Origami is the traditional art of folding paper which traces its roots to 17^th century Japan. The goal of true origami is to transform a flat sheet of paper into a completed sculpture without the use of scissors or glue. The paper crane is probably the best known example of origami. Supposedly there is an ancient Japanese legend that promises the granting of a wish to anyone who folds a thousand paper cranes. I’ve been making paper cranes for at least thirty years now. I usually make them out of my sacrament meeting program on Sunday mornings; not because I’m bored with the meeting, but because I find it difficult to sit with idle hands. If I made one crane every week during that entire time, I’ve passed the one thousand mark several years back. Clearly I should have been keeping track.