Sharing the Oldies #2

What thrills you about antique quilt finds?

I’ll tell you what thrills me ----

EVERYTHING!

((Of course!))

But mostly, the humble fabrics that were used to make them.

Quilts used to come out of ordindary every day scraps, the bottom of the bag, the less usable pieces that were too small for making clothing, or the cuts left after making clothing, or sometimes the salvageable parts of clothing after they had lived their lives as wearable articles.

We often look at old quilts and find places where two smaller pieces of the same fabric have been seamed together to make a piece big enough to cut out a patch the size and shape needed for the quilt block ---sometimes those seams were indeed, already there ---and templates were just placed over the seams in clothing and patches were cut – with the seam wherever it already was.

This is a lovely Album quilt owned by Terri Ayers!

This is another one of those quilts “sold on the cheap” to her by a couple of young uppities who didn’t want “old stuff” and didn’t know the value of what they had.  Were they selling off Great Grannie’s quilts?  ((Check out the quilt I shared last night HERE!))

I love the almost patriotic appearance of this quilt – but there are some other “non flag” colored fabrics going on in these sweet blocks too….check it out:

Some brown and some double pink!

Love those shirtings and backgrounds!

This fabric is a surprise!

There are a lot of more masculine prints in this quilt, plaids and indigoes and stripes especially, but this dress print…can you SEE this as a dress?

I was thinking at first that this was a quilt from around 1900, hut this dress fabric might be from just a bit earlier --

One purple gingham in the center!

More purple gingham in the center, but framed by a lavender stripe around the outside edge of the block.  The pastel purples make me think around 1920 for them --this quilt came from a deep scrap stash!

Some dress print, some indigo – and LOVE those huge polka dots!

If it’s blue, it goes here!

Or here too!

I really wish these old quilts could talk and tell their story.  This one was quilted by the piece in each block, and on the diagonal in one direction in the alternate red setting blocks.

I love the connection to quilters past and the time honored recognizable blocks they made –each changing them and making them in their own way to suit their own personalities.  I imagine them working on their blocks, laying them out carefully, pulling fabrics they thought would work here or there, that feeling of finishing the top…of stretching the top, backing and batting in the frame, those first quilting stitches taken, that moment of completion, of sewing down the binding – and finally, finally, spreading the quilt over a comfy bed and snuggling in for a long night next to someone she loved dearly.

Yes, antique quilts are all that and more to me ---and I just can’t get enough of them!

The Sewing Expo has come to a close.  I had such a great time with everyone – I’m staying the night because it is too late to start a 9 hour journey home this evening – so I’ll get a good night’s sleep and hit the road in the morning.

Tonight?  I sew!

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