IT'S QUILTED, WASHED AND READY TO GO!

For those of you who have helped me with suggestions regarding the old quilt, here is is. I finished it and washed it in a front loader on gentle cold cycle as suggested.

I used the bamboo batting for the inside and stippled it carefully reinforcing the blocks as I went along as some of them were a bit frayed to say the least. I also used a number 11 needle as I thought that it was good to use a finer needle than the Jeans size due to the delicacy of the fabric.

The quilt is small than the original, but I do have one block left to save for my Uncle and Aunt to frame in remembrance of the original work of my grandmother.

I am happy to be finished with it and am very pleased how it turned out. Considering that I do not think of myself as a refurbisher of quilts but will try just about anything sort of person, this I consider to be a job well done and the quilt is preserved!

I also decided to bind the quilt in a red fabric to pop the red that was already on the quilt. I think this just finishes my love of this quilt done by my grandmother for her "baby" and his wife.

So, for Jerome and Linda, here it is.

ANOTHER NEW QUILT!

This is my new quilt, finished yesterday while feeling a bit under the weather! I don't know what happens to me, sometimes I just can't get going for the day. Yesterday was one of those days, so I did the hand finishing on this quilt.





I think it's supposed to be prairie queen? But I didn't put strips in and just combined the white blocks together and it looks good. Not my usual kind of quilt though.





I like using different patterns than this. But since doing the Pat Sloan orange quilt along, I decided to try a few different patterns.





I used only fabrics that I had left over from other projects and managed to make about 65" X 70" which is large for me to make. But I tell you the Janome 6600 that I use has lots of room to make this size and larger! I used a Jeans needle and the batting is bamboo which is a great product to work with. It's softer than the warm and white that I usually use.

I did the back in the same print as in one of the
blocks on the front.

I am also a fan of spraying because I tell you it takes about half the time to put the quilt together.

I am fortunate that I have a large work table to work on and maybe that makes it easier to manoeuver the fabrics. But it takes me about 20 minutes from start to finish, give or take a few minutes.

AND, while I was quilting Jerry is working on an old sideboard that we have had for a few years and want to take it to the cottage this summer. It will sit in the sunroom below the kitchen window. Right now all we have there is small table that we dump everything on. When we have the kids come with all their stuff, we hope that there will be less dumping at the door of the sun room. We'll see. I will post next on the sideboard. It is an antique with the back of it having a 14" pine board. You sure don't see that any more.

I am also quilting the old quilt. I used a block that I had to test how it would look stippled. It's the only way to go with it because I can go over the seams of the blocks and still have it looking good. I will post it when it's done. It's going to look good. Trust me!

THE OLD QUILT REPAIRED

When I got this old quilt, the sentimental value of it was what was important. I just didn't know how I would repair the blocks so that they would hold together.


So after all the comments and getting advice from Helen, a hand quilter also, I took the blocks apart and salvaged 14 original blocks. The ones that I just couldn't save, I discarded and then I took all the strips off the remaining blocks.





That took a few days and you can imagine what an expert "picker" I am now. I looked these 14 blocks over and realized that the measurements along with the age of the blocks, I may have also taken a bit off the sizing of the original blocks.



The first photo is the block as it was in its original

state. The second photo is after a lightly starched
and fused block. It was amazing what happened
when I fused the block. Not only did it stabilize
the block, but the colours came to life!

I don't know whether it shows in the photo or not, but really it looked like night and day.

I found an odd coloured check fabric that I used for the strips of the now fused blocks, I just didn't find a pale yellow that looked good with the quilt
as it is now.





The fusible web I used is called Stacy and it worked
so well and it was also very very light. I actually was
able to add little strips as needed because of the
sizing issues I had with some of the squares.




I have also decided to stipple it, but with larger
strokes than I usually do in order to not take away from the quilt pattern.

I am going to use the check as the back of the quilt and probably will keep it really simple by using that as the binding also.


I don't think I would ever do another "restoration"
as I'm not into that, but my grandmother made
this, and she gave it to my uncle Jerome and
his wife Linda as a wedding gift. It was made and given with love over 40 years ago and it has been used and loved all these years. So when I give it back to them, I hope that they have it for a good while.

I think that the instructions for washing will be
to dryclean or hand wash at best. I do have a front loading washer and it has a gentle cycle, so that will be ok I think.

The final photo is of the top pressed and ready
for the next step.

I am using bamboo batting, as it's my new favorite even though I do like warm and white
also. But the bamboo has a bit more flexiblility. The next job will be to quilt it and I do have the extra square to work with and see what works best.