54 49 or fight

Thank you Judy in Ohio and Nancy H . You are both very helpful. My templates came today so I'm ready to start. We went to the "Three Rivers Quilt Show" today Pittsburgh Pa. area It was a very nice show. Lots of venders but they had mostly fabric. I promised myself I would not buy fabric. I just bought a can of spray adhesive 505 to try. Spent more on lunch than shopping. Still had a great day. Vi

First picture

This is a neonatal quilt made from leftover squares. I find that I use my digital camera mainly for taking pictures of quilts and my cats - sometimes both subjects at once.

We are supposed to have a beautiful weekend. I suppose I'll be outside a lot but I am determined to quilt a little too.

54-40 or Fight (or Tennessee Waltz)

Vi - Here is the picture of the 54-40 or Fight (or Tennessee Waltz) that I'm in the process of HQing. Maybe it'll help with your color placement. I did the piecing over about a year's time in between other projects (it's king size). It's been on the frame for about 6 months and it's been slow-going. Probably because I know I have over a year to get it finished - I promised it to DS & DDIL when they return from their overseas stint with the Army. They chose the colors and I was happy with the result. NancyH

Finding Inspiration at Webshots.com

Vi, when I get stuck for an idea on color usage I go to www.webshots.com and do a search. People post photos on all kinds of subjects but if you type in topics like "black and white quilt" or "Y2K quilt" (without any quotation marks) you can see photos of many, many quilts from all over the world. This is not exactly "cheating" .... this is using a valuable resource.

With that in mind I typed in your idea of 54-40 or fight quilt and here's what came up: http://www.webshots.com/search?query=54+40+or+fight+quilt&new=1&source=chromeheader

Some of the first batch of photos seem kind of funky and not really photos of quilts but then it is an unusual quilt name so that word "fight" kind of made Webshots give interesting results .... LOL

Judy

54 40 or fight

I want to make a" 54 40 or fight quilt by hand" I ordered the Ardco templates. What do you recomend for color placement. I have a pastel pink, soft purple and light green. I want to do the one with the 4 patch in the corner. These pastels will be hard for me. Vi

Too cool!

What a great project! And what a dear little doll cradle. The quilt is perfect with it.

Pat in Rockport, TX

Yep! That's the Quilt!

Thank you, Judy in Ohio, for posting a pic of Nova's doll quilt! I searched for an hour for the photo on my computer and could not find it! It was a joy to make this little quilt. I used vintage 1880-1910 fabrics gleaned from old quilt tops that were not useable as is. I plan to use the fabrics posted below as the lights in a similar quilt for myself. I'd say "for my dolly" but I don't have one of that era. LOL. For the darks I'll use some vintage indigo blues, mourning blacks and some burgundy.

Why I Needed a Hand Quilted Vintage Scrappy Doll Quilt

The little girl in the photo is my husband's grandmother Nova Dickerson who was born in 1891 in a coal mining hamlet in southern Ohio. Someone built and gave her a doll baby cradle and, since she lived in a dirt-floored cabin, she was also given a smooth flat board to put her cradle on so it would be "rockable". Fast forward to the year 2000 and Nova's oldest daughter, my husband's Aunt Thelma, has died and we find the pieces of Grandma's doll cradle (and the smooth flat board that goes with it) among Aunt Thelma's possessions. The cradle had separated over the years .... dried out and fallen apart but no pieces weere broken. I asked if we could have it as a keepsake and since no one else was interested it becomes ours. I washed the cradle parts with Murphy's Oil Soap as a "restorative" and plotted and schemed.

I sent a photo of the reassembled cradle to JudyPete and told her of my plans to make a ticking "mattress" on my sewing machine and how I was going to order an old-style doll with a photo transfer of Nova's face on the doll. I dropped a VERY SUBTLE HINT that this cradle might need something small and exquisitely hand quilted to rest on top of the ticking mattress. This, of course, was like waving a red flag in front of a bull. LOL

JudyPete created the lovely doll quilt you see in this photo and and gave it to me after she had an article about it published in the Fall, 2002 issue of "Country Quilts" magazine. This is called "quilting two birds with one needle" or something like that .... :-)

Judy

Vintage Fabric Sample Davidson Bros Company

I have a small stash of bits and pieces of vintage cotton fabrics. While picking through them yesterday I found these fabric samples with labels that read Davidson Bros Company. These are shirting fabrics and I know they are very early 1900s. If anyone can date them more accurately, let me know. They are very small pieces and I plan to use them to make a scrappy doll quilt similar to one I made for a quilting buddy several years ago. Davidson Bros Company was a family owned department store in Sioux City, Iowa during the very late 1800s and early 1900s. Their sales included catalog sales and I'm guessing these were sent out in the mail so the seamstress could select which fabrics she wished to order.

Making a Plug For Project Linus

Al Roker from the Today Show traveled to Fargo, North Dakota and did a touching story on the local chapter of Project Linus in that city. Here's a very long link that will take you to a five or six minute long streaming video of his story on the women of Fargo who make quilts and afghans that will bring "hugs" to children ... and you might want to have a tissue or two handy while you watch. I hope this link works for you.

http://video.msn.com/v/us/fv/msnbc/fv.htm??f=00&g=0bc70839-8b9c-4013-b422-00ebd3f61daf&p=hotvideo_m_edpicks&t=m5&rf=http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3032633/&fg=

Judy in Ohio, Project Linus Coordinator for Marion County

Doing the Herky Jerky

Most of you guessed how that was done but let me see if I can explain it. You start with a black square. The whole design is cut up into sections and you put it together block by block. The shapes are fused to the background leaving the black spaces between them. With feed dogs lowered you go around each piece with this 'herky jerky' stitching which is indescribable. You have to use a stabilizer under the fabric. I used fabric softener sheets. After years of careful stitching it's a hoot to do but does take quite a while. Each square is done separately then joined together.
There, I think I've done it. More questions?
Milli in MA

To Brenda in Ontario

Congratulations on your progress. You'll be back sewing soon, I hope. At least you are one step closer. Keep us posted!
Milli in MA

Trying to post a picture

I tried to post a picture of this quilt (and the job my wonderful MQer does) a while back. It didn't work then, but we'll see if I can make it go today.

Kathi in gloomy Idaho

Here's another!!

Happy to see someone else enjoyed Dianne Hire's book. She came to our guild a couple of years ago and was delightful. Her book is full of neat ideas and I used one of them to do some zinnias. The floor was knee deep in scraps as I auditioned different fabric to get the colors I wanted! I also got so excited I added seed beads to the center of the flowers. Very unusual for me. I'm going to try come of the other ideas someday.
Milli in MA

If You Want to Try Something New .... Here's a Book For You

Milli obviously had fun with her Herky Jerky tree project and I'd like to suggest another book that offered some "fun" ideas for me. Dianne S. Hire has written "Quilters Playtime: Games With Fabrics" and you can indeed play games (like Tic Tac Toe) with her ideas and your fabrics. Her ideas enable you to "loosen up" and try new things without huge investments of time and fabric ... you go stash diving and you play and you let your creative juices "flow" as the saying goes.

This particular wallhanging was created for an international competition and sent off to Bunbury, Australia. Those naughty Australians had sent me a packet of four very calm tiny black and white prints (not my kind of fabrics at all!!) and I've forgotten what their theme was ... but I called this "Shattered Trellis" and they hung it in their show anyway. :-) Their judge's note complimented my quilting which I made rather dense so the colored parts would "pop". And yes, the edges of this wallhanging are crooked and the blocks deliberately don't match up properly. That was part of Dianne's "playtime" idea in her book ..... take the attitude of an enthusiastic child and PLAY with your fabric pieces, within reason of course, because you do want to wind up with a finished product. LOL

Judy

Jane in NC

What fine looking grandkids and I'm quite impressed by their sewing projects. The men in my family always seem to go for the really geometric-looking blocks and quilts. Your grandsons seem to think the same way. I'll bet they're a joy to have as guests. :-)

Tried something new

The title of the book I took this from was "Do the Herky Jerky" by Kathleen Parman. I loved the tree she did using this method. Have to say it wasn't one of your "quickies", but everyone liked the effect.

Snow in Pa.

Hi Everyone, What a winter day we are having here in Pa. Heavy wet snow and some power outages which may occur again. I wanted to comment on Beth's Quilt. It is beautiful. Gee, you live close enough to me I could come see it in person. (just kidding) Yesterday I sewed all day with my daughter and a friend. That is always a fun thing. I don't post often but enjoy reading about everyones lives. Marge

Fixing Postings on the BB

Rosey and I have corresponded by email for years (and I snail-mailed her a paper-piecing lesson ages ago but I don't think that worked LOL). That is why I felt she would not be too terribly annoyed by my suggestion about erasing her alpaca posting on the BB. Since we BBers are now 21st century bloggers, this version of the WWQP BB is such a delight compared to the old version .... we can change our minds and change our postings with a click of the mouse. Here's what I sent to Rosey:

---------
You go to the page where you make your new posting entry and right above the pane where you can type your new message there's a tab sticking up that says "Edit Posts" or something like that. (I use a Mac so I suspect that what I see is not the same thing as what Windows users see). When you get to the Edit Posts page there should be a great long "grocery list" of all the postings from all the BBers, starting with the most recent, and you will have the option to either edit your postings or even delete any one of yours. Tick the box in front of it and click the "delete" box after it and it'll be gone.

You cannot delete mine. Tee hee.

No matter how tempted you are to obliterate someone you cannot delete the postings of another BBer, just your own.
------

See, I let Rosey know she couldn't erase me. :-) If you ever make a posting you are not happy with once you see it on the BB you can go back and erase it and then go to the "Create" pane and start over again. Or you can edit it and erase certain parts.

That's why blogging is such an improvement over our old WWQP BB.

Judy

my weekend

I'm waiting for some stencils I ordered to come in to do some hand quilting. I decided to work on some projects that have been itchin' to get out of my fingers and head. I haven't been able to sit for long periods of time due to back surgery, so I'm honing some my skills. Blue. blue. blue.

TRYING THE CORRECT BOARD THIS TIME

I just did the same darned thing Rosey did. Here it is:

Perhaps Judy can tell me how to fix the large boo-boo on that kid post. I'm afraid people won't realize that if the scroll all the way down they can access the preceding posts. I've also managed to post a duplicate comment today so perhaps I shouldn't be posting again at all.I am still very exhausted from the visit but wouldn't trade it in for anything. If I could stand the density of population and the climate I'd move closer to them. My guild has welcomed kids and several members have helped classroom teachers who want to do a quilt activity with the kids. One of our members leads a 4-H quilt club which meets in the class room of another member's quilt shop. There is real concern in this area of the country about preserving and passing on the Southern Appalachian culture and arts so there are many efforts being made in that area. I am also so pleased to see youngsters being mentored by the self taught musicians who perform everything from medieval ballads to blue grass. My neighbor, a house painter and craftsman who makes his own banjos, guitars and mandolins has taken a local boy under his wing. That boy has won regional awards and loves what he's doing. He's about the same age as my grandsons. Our guild show, like so many others, has a special youth category in our show. They all get some special recognition just for entering. There is a man in our guild who, after retiring from engineering, has taught himself to quilt and has brought his lovely granddaughter to the table as well. That is one lucky girl. The two of them are joined at the hip. I gather that he and his wife are more parents to her than her parents. She told me once that they "weren't very involved" in her life.Now let's see if I can post this correctly in the right place and only once.Jane in NC where they are predicting very high winds, possibly up to 60mph and up to an inch of snow at elevations above 3000 ft. I'm at 2900 ft.

No projects to post :(

Ok, seems I don't get any sewing done these daze, but it doesn't
stop me from preparing for the day.....
This fabric jumped into my arms yesterday, LQS had a wonderful sale!
Jane , love the kids! Our guild does an outreach program for kids,
the boys have a better time than the girls! Jill

Deleting posts

Thanks to Judy in Ohio who suggested that I delete the two posts that got onto the wrong board. She instructed me on how to remove them, which I hope has happened...will check after this is posted and hope I've done it correctly.
Rosey