However, if I try to do this all at once, the blog post will be *huge*. So, instead, I will take them one by one, in as much in order that they were made as I can remember.
Ready for some history?
MY VERY FIRST QUILT!
I was at my Grandmother's house and she was cleaning out and getting rid of "stuff". She unearthed a quilt that her mother had made. It was truly falling apart. Many of the seams had come apart ( and it was easy to see that she used a blanket for the batting!). It really was in bad shape. My grandmother was going to throw it out. ACK!!! "Noooooo", I objected. I couldn't imaging throwing out a quilt made by my great-grandmother. I figured, "I know how to sew. So I can save parts of this quilt by making (re-making) it." Keep in mind that I had never made a quilt before. Here's a photo of this quilt after I finished it:
Looking back, here's what I remember (some some of the techniques that I would probably not use today [otherwise known as "mistakes"]):
I decided to save the "flowers" from the quilt, so I carefully removed all of them. However, some of those flowers were also falling apart, so I let those go to trash. When I finally had my stash flowers, I needed new background fabric for them. I when to my local fabric shop (I didn't know that there existed anything known as "quilt shop"). I looked all over that fabric shop for a plain white fabric. Arrrrggghhh! Could not find any. All right, next best thing was white fabric that had woven texture. (today I would shudder at this) I bought a bunch, took it home, and cut it into squares. Then I started re-appliqueing the flowers, using the same blanket stitch to attach the flowers, duplicating what my great-grandmother had done.
Eventually, all the blocks were finished and I got them all sewed together. Hmmmm. What in the world am I going to do about fabric for the back of the quilt? Fabric doesn't come that wide. (I don't know about *then*, but I know it now comes as wide as 120", more than wide enough. But, I digress.) Ah-hah! I know! I'll use a sheet! So off I went to find a queen size flat sheet in a lovely peachy-orange color. I used my grandmother's living room floor to layer everything. Then came the hand-quilting. Yes, folks, I hand-quilted this baby. I threaded up my needle just like I always did when sewing clothes: a nice length of thread, doubled-up with both ends used to make a nice knot! (Ummmm, that was *not* a quilter's knot. It was both ends of the thread wrapped around the end of one finger and then *rolled* off the finger into a large, ugly knot. Now I know that real quilters use a single length of thread, with a tiny knot that can be pulled into the middle of the quilt "sandwich". Oh, well.) I had one hand under the quilt and one hand on top and I quilted that quilt using the same hand motions that I used for needlepoint. (Of course, that resulted in the stitches on the back of the quilt being all different sizes and going in all different directions!) Oh, and I used a ruler and lead pencil to draw lines on the blocks so I would know where to quilt. And then came my final problem: How will I finish the edges of my quilt? (think, ponder, more thinking) Ohhhh! I know! All I need to do is fold the excess sheet over the top of my quilt, tuck the edges under, and stitch it down (thus making a border-binding). I even mitered my corners. I was so proud of that quilt when it was finished.
I refuse to be ashamed of the mistakes. After all, I didn't know any better. Besides, even with mistakes, that quilt still provides warmth at night; and a "perfect" quilt would not be any warmer than this one. I just refer to it as my "quilt with character". And, best of all, I have preserved something from my great-grandmother's quilt.
Kathy
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