Neenie's Surprises

Excuse me, what?
Not much sewing this week, unfortunately; I've got about a hundred (I wish I were kidding) HST blocks I need to trim before I can even think about having fun sewing more of them, so I spent a lot of time focusing on getting caught up in that department. I hate trimming them, but I know the finished product will be ever so lovely once I'm done.

I'm sure you're more interested in what Neenie (my grandmother, for whom Faith-Ann is named) has been doing though!



The surprise!
Neenie and I have been having lovely email chats together, and I mentioned that I would love to get these two quilting books I've wanted for ages, but never gotten, especailly with my birthday coming up next week (eek!). Well, sure enough I found a little package waiting for me at the apartment door, with Twist and Turn Bargello Quilts and the Quilter's Reference tool! I'm so happy to have them, I've always loved bargellos, and I'm planning on cutting my teeth on the table runner/placemat project!

But, I can hear you say, what is that lovely blue and white quilt underneath the books?

A piece of family history. :)
Well, Neenie mentioned after I'd gotten the books that she had a quilt my great-grandmother had owned, a quilt that my grandmother had used when she was a child. She was planning on cutting it up for potholders (!), but decided it would have a lovely home with me instead. It's an amazing piece of history, even more so when I consider that this quilt is either as old as Faith-Ann, or even possibly older. I spent about an hour poring over the top, taking measurements and looking at the construction.

The simplest component: a white square.
It's all handquilted, and whatever damage there is (see the first picture) seems to have been due to the fabric, not the stitching giving way. The stitches themselves are tiny and regular--go ahead and look at the zoomed in pictures of the blocks, you'll see what I mean.

This one could be fun to paper piece.
Taking measurements was surprisingly difficult, due to the warping and stretching in the blocks from decades of use. I believe they're mean to be 5 1/2 inches finished, so that would be 6 inches before sewing it all together.

The quilting is impressively straight!
Neenie's not sure who the original quilter was, and unfortunately there doesn't seem to be a label on the back that I could see. Honestly though, I'm just so happy she thought of me and thought to send it on to me. I'm actually planning on doing a project with it; I'd like to try my hand at recreating this quilt with modern techniques and fabric, to both preserve the original and to try and recreate a piece of quilting (however small) history. Thank you so much Neenie!

Next week's update should go up without any problems (with a new batch of red and white blocks), but the week after might be slightly delayed due to video game shenanigans. Then a regular update, and then I'll be doing some catch up with the Lancaster show.

As a side note, if you like this blog and my quilting, the highest compliment you can pay me is to send it along to others who might be interested. We just passed 5,000 total views on the blog, and I felt such a milestone deserved some thanks to you, my lovely and dear readers. Thank you for reading, and I will see you next week!

TC is looking for that next post. Only a week away!

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