For the Love of an Old Quilt

A dear old friend reluctantly handed me a bag of deteriorated quilts, knowing that I enjoy the challenge of  transforming something old into something new and fantastic.  I've made lots of skirts and bags from old quilt tops.  I've even repaired some old torn quilts and restored them back to their former glory.  I could tell these deteriorated quilts were near and dear to her heart as she told me that her sweet Aunt had made these back in the 1930s.  She cherished them and was so disappointed that other generations of her family had not treated them well.  One of the quilts even had cigarette burns all over it.

I salvaged some star blocks from one quilt and decided to try making a few pillows.  As you can see,  these old quilts were stuffed full with carded cotton batting from the good old days.  I'm glad we have better batting choices these days!

These were very thick to sew through but my Bernina 750QE handled it like a champ!  After sewing the initial seam, I used the extra wide zigzag stitch to secure the seam allowance neatly.  Love that option to adjust the width of any stitch up to 7 mm wide!

I thought a square pillow would be a bit boring so I trimmed them like a hexagon and sewed them up.  It surprised me when they came out looking like a flower after I stuffed them!  If  I can come up with a few clever ways to cover up the burn spots, I might just whip up a few of these for my dear old friend.  I think she might like to give them to her great grandchildren just to keep them in the family.  

I'll be linking up to Crazy Mom Quilts Friday Finish blog this week.  

Just Add More Stitches

I made the one hour trip to my favorite quilt shop, Lola Pink in Lafayette, LA, and fell in love three steps into the shop.  The new fabric line, Persimmon by Moda, just reached out to me and I knew that jelly roll had to come home with me.  Now I'm usually not a jelly roll kind of gal. I don't know if it's the price or the perfectly coordinated formula, but something usually makes me steer clear of them. Anyhow, the colors made me take the leap into jellyrolls and I'm glad I did!  I also selected an unModa step child fabric that I adored for border potential.  I made sixteen patch blocks--sooo easy with jelly rolls. I just separated the strips into darks and lights. I loved interchanging the medium fabrics as they can become either a dark or a light depending upon which fabric it is combined with. 

I planned a loose,comfy feel for the quilt so I assumed that meant loosely spaced quilting design.  I chose a wave quilting line through each block but it didn't seem like enough.  Then I added a simple seed line design at the connection seam of each column of blocks. It still looked awkward.

Even after unstitching and restitching, it didn't look "right enough'".   My excellent quilter friend, Gayle, encouraged me to just add more stitches until it feels right. 

Then in the middle of my quilting mojo, my machine gives me this message. 

What the heck????  I am in free motion mode with feed dogs down so why is my Bernina 750QE doing this crazy talk and locking up?  I finally figured it out and made a blog post for my Loving my bernina series to help other owners of the persnickety Bernina 750QE. 

So I finally reaching the point of enough and it's amazing what the right amount of stitching can do for a quilt. I love the feel and texture of the quilt now. I am selecting binding fabrics now. I'm kinda leaning toward a dark blue binding.

I will be posting this week at Freshly Pieced WIP and Crazy Mom Quilts Finish Up Friday.