Blogger's Quilt Festival Spring 2013

Welcome!  I am excited to share a special quilt with you for Blogger's Quilt Festival.  I know there is a lot of quilty goodness to see on all the many links for the quilt festival hosted by Amy's Creative Side, and I appreciate your stopping here for a bit.  I'd love it if you'd say hi in the comments.

The story of this quilt starts with me doing some cleaning (it gets more exciting, trust me) last October.  In the process of decluttering my basement space where I sew, I moved a big green Rubbermaid storage tote out of the way, which had come from my late mother's house a few years before.  I wasn't sure what was in it but figured probably more stuff to haul to Goodwill.  Boy, was I wrong!

Inside the container was an old quilt top, which I recognized by its handiwork as having been made by my grandmother, Lillian, probably back in the late 1960s or early 1970s.

Grandma Lillian C., early 1970s, Louisiana.

Grandma loved to sew, and even when her eyesight faded in her later years, she continued to find a way to piece quilts.  She used just about everything in the way of fabric and scraps.  I even have a quilt she made of polyester double knit hexagons, if you can imagine that.

Grandma's quilt top, c. late 1960s/early 1970s.

This particular quilt top that I found was bold and colorful, which is just how I like 'em.  I think Grandma and I were "cut from the same cloth" in that way.

I had never seen this quilt top before, and I wondered how long my mom had it.  Had Grandma made it with one of her grandchildren in mind?  She was known to do that, and since she lived a thousand miles away on the other side of the country (and perhaps because of her eyesight and/or other reasons), she might send a quilt top to Mom and rely on it being quilted and finished on the receiving end.  As I looked closely at the various fabrics and handled it, I understood perhaps why Mom had put it away and didn't rush to finish it.  There are some challenges to be sorted out, for sure.  But on the whole, there's a lot of love in this quilt, and I think it's beautiful and inspirational, like my grandma.

Mom and Grandma, late 1960s, Wisconsin.

The block pattern really intrigued me.  I mentioned in my post about finding the quilt that I wanted to try making the block if I could find a pattern.  It is entirely pieced, not appliqued.  I hadn't seen anything quite like it, but I thought I might find it in one of my older reference books (no such luck). 

And here is where I tell you what you already probably know:  Fellow quilt bloggers are the best!  Within a very short time of that post, Sandi of Piecemeal Quilts drew up the block in her quilt design program, based on the photos I'd posted, and sent me a PDF complete with templates.  How amazing and wonderfully generous is that!

Two days later, I sent Sandi a photo of the test block I'd made.  Though I didn't have a whole lot of experience piecing curves, it all worked out beautifully.  The block was square and true to size and lay flat and smooth.  I was thrilled!

Sandi responded by showing me a sample quilt layout she had created "just playing around" with the blocks set on point.  It was simply gorgeous, and I knew I had to make it.  Over the next few days, we chatted by email about fabric choices and other possibilities.  This was going to be so much fun!

I got started on this quilt right away, and except for the almost-fiasco where I knocked a cup of coffee onto it in the final hours of assembly, it went together really well.  I finished the quilt top in early January and sent it off to be quilted.

Sandi did the quilting on her longarm.  She filled in the white space with freehand leaves and swirls and did parallel quilting in the cross pieces of the blocks.  So pretty!  When she was done, Sandi, her mom, and her aunt made the couple-hour drive to delivered it in person, so we finally got to meet!

The fabrics I used are from the Vintage Modern line by Bonnie and Camille for Moda.  I loved the turquoise and red color combination.  The soft floral prints have a soft, vintage feel, while the overall quilt has a contemporary look.  

Quilt Specifics

Quilt measures:  80 x 80 inches

Special techniques used:  Curved piecing from templates

Quilted by:  Sandi Walton

Blogger's Quilt Festival Category: Bed Quilt

I'd like to make another one of these, maybe a wild and scrappy version next time around. I think Grandma would be tickled!

Would you like to give it a try?  Stay tuned, because I will be doing a tutorial on how to make the four-lily block in the coming weeks, and I hope you'll join me for that.  In addition, Sandi and I are finishing the pattern for this quilt, which should be available in the near future, as well.

Updated March 2023:  The Thoroughly Modern Lily quilt pattern is available as a free PDF HERE. Click the download symbol on the page that opens.

Custom acrylic templates for the Four-Lily block used in making this quilt are available at DMP Engraving. 

Tutorial for the Four-Lily Block can be found on the Tutorials tab at the top of the blog.

Thanks so much for taking time to visit, and I hope you will stop back again soon!

~Paulette

Blogger's Quilt Festival - Shadowed Squares

I'm sliding in under the wire for the Blogger's Quilt Festival, but I am so happy to share this quilt with you just the same. I made this last year for my friend B., who lives in Germany, from a pattern she'd saved for many years.  It's an Amish style quilt called Shadowed Squares.  

B. said:

I tried to remember when I first clipped the directions out of some magazine.  The pages are browning with age.  I know it was before I moved to Germany.  It may even have been when I was still living in Southern California, which means well over 30 years ago.  I know I had spoken to my mom once about making the quilt for me, but when I asked her, she had transferred her handcraft focus from sewing to crocheting.  I had taken the pattern to the local quilting shop in downtown Munich to ask about maybe having it made up by a quilter there.  The price they quoted me was so astronomical, I immediately blotted the idea and the price out of my mind.

I told B. I'd be happy to make the quilt for her, and that there was a good chance I could have it quilted by a local Amish woman who had quilted a quilt for me previously.  (You can read about how I met the quilter, Mrs. Miller, here.)  B. sent me the clipping, and I was off!

This was the first commission work I'd ever done, and I thought it'd be fun to make a journal of the story of making B.'s quilt for her, and send that to her along with the quilt when it was finished.  According to my journal, I started the quilt making adventure on a 19-degree, sunny day in early March 2009 with a trip to the fabric store for some Kona cotton, which happened to be on sale!  B. requested a muted color palette for her quilt (she knows my penchant for bright, zinger colors).  I complied with her wishes, naturally, eliminating a too-bright pink from the mix after I'd sewn a couple of test blocks.

The pattern predated rotary cutting and strip piecing and called for individual templates to be cut for the strips.  I knew there was a better way!  I foundation pieced the blocks instead, sewing the various colored strips onto 11-inch squares of paper (removed later), then laying a black fabric square rights sides together on top of that, and sewing 1/4-inch seams along both sides of a diagonal line.  This block "sandwich" was then cut between the sewn lines along the diagonal, resulting in two half black/half strippy squares, which were then trimmed to 10-1/2 inches.

Mrs. Miller was indeed amenable to doing the quilting, and I took the quilt top, batting, and backing to her in late April.  We discussed how it would be quilted, per B.'s pattern.  In late September, a letter arrived from Mrs. Miller that it was done and I could come pick it up.

The quilting was beautiful!  Such lovely hand work!  Here are some close-ups, which I had to lighten in order to see the quilting on the black background.  Thanks, B., for taking all of these photos this week.  In my haste and excitement to mail her the quilt last October, I totally forgot to take any pictures of the finished, quilted quilt!

I truly enjoyed making this quilt for my friend and was happy that it could be hand quilted in a manner in keeping with its Amish inspiration.  In my final quilt journal entry, I noted the following:

There is one corner that is not quilted exactly like the others...I am reminded of a myth I have heard:  "Amish women put a mistake in each quilt because only God is perfect; therefore, it would be prideful to make a perfect quilt.  Yet it has been pointed out by some Amish women that making such a mistake would be prideful in itself, as it would imply the quilt maker believes herself to indeed be perfect.  Though some rare purposeful mistakes may have been for religious reasons, it appears for others it was more a matter of superstition.  In reality, all quilters make mistakes.  It's almost impossible to make a perfect quilt." [Source: Womenfolk.com/History of Quilts]

I put my quilt label directly under this special corner.

Upon "rescuing" her quilt from the Customs Office in Munich, B. sent me a wonderfully funny and touching email.  Here is an excerpt:

I sail out of the Customs Office smiling ear to ear...I am in the Wow This is Wonderful mood.  They sure don't see that very often at the Customs Office.  I force myself to leave the quilt in its protective plastic bag and box and put it in the back of the car, instead of ogling it immediately in the parking lot.  Home safe in the garage.  Into the apartment.  Open box, unwrap quilt.  Unfold.

I am overwhelmed.  The colors are different than I projected or how they looked in the computer pictures.  I like them better than either one.  These are real.  The fabric is alive, not an idea but real stitches and real material, real care, real knowing how to make something beautiful and functional.  It contains a value I hold sacred.  Generations and generations of women making, creating, doing with their own hands beautiful, useful, wonderful things for their friends and families.

That, my friends, is what it's all about, isn't it?

Thank you for visiting today.  For more beautiful, creative, wonderful things, be sure to visit the Blogger's Quilt Festival hosted by Amy's Creative Side.