Can I Get a Whoop Whoop? It Was A Very Good Day!

Hi, all!

Where did our week go? Seems like it was just Monday - but here it is, Friday, and you know what that means!  Time for us to get our whoop whoop on!  Are you ready?  I am - so let's go!

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This afternoon I was despairing, trying to figure out what I had to whoop about this week - it's been a busy week working on one quilt that I'm not anywhere near ready to share pictures of, and that's about all I've done.  And I didn't have any time to work on a quick finish, because I had to meet a friend about a quilt ministry fabric donation.

So I headed off to an antique store that was going out of business - the word was that she had fabric she wanted to donate to the ministry.  As I love antique stores, and none better than one going out of business with great discounts, I showed up a few minutes early so I could look around and see what she had.  

I saw lots of beautiful Depression glass (which I managed to resist, with much pain) but then I spotted a vintage quilt that needed further examination.

Look at those lovely colors!!  And as near as I can tell, not a worn spot on the entire top.  And then I saw.....

....the name of the person who made the quilt - and we share a first name, even spelled correctly!  Of course, this quilt had to come home with me - and for the bargain price of, get this, $45!

Look at that beautiful hand quilting - Baptist Fan and as pretty as I've ever seen on a vintage quilt.  This one has such a contemporary feel, despite its age.

But wait, that's not all!  After I saw this quilt, I spotted another one - a pretty feed sack quilt that was in excellent condition, except for needing a good (and careful) washing.  But unfortunately, the shop owner knew what she had, and it was priced higher than I wanted to pay - $189.95.  So I moved on.

In another room of the antique store, I found a second feedback quilt, with stunningly bright colors.  Unfortunately, this one had some pretty major damage where it had been folded and probably displayed, and the muslin in some of the blocks had deteriorated and broken. Also, no price tag on this one, so I regretfully put it back.

Hugging my one vintage quilt tightly, I went to the counter.  In conversation, I told the shop owner that she had lovely taste in quilts, with two more beautiful examples, but it was such a shame that the one quilt I saw had been damaged so badly.  She made a joke about people who were as old as that quilt also having cracks and blemishes, and I laughed, saying that I repaired many quilts in like condition. She asked if I could repair that one, and I told her that yes, it could be repaired.  We went to look at it, and surprisingly, she told me that she would sell it to me for $40!  So here's my next awesome find....

Look at all those beautiful feed sack fabrics, laid out in a granny square pattern! Hand pieced and hand quilted.  The only problem with this quilt is some of the muslin squares....

...which have dried out and worn away on the edges where this quilt was folded up.  But wonder of wonders, with some muslin, tea bags, and patience, I can make patches for these blocks that will blend right in and fix the problem!  So of course, this quilt had to come home with me.

Then the shop owner walked back to the back to find the one remaining quilt.  I went with her to look at it one more time, just for the joy of it.  And then she offered to sell it to me for $70.... so what's a girl to do?  Take it home, of course!  Look at this beauty...

Isn't she lovely?  Yes, there are age stains and I'll have to wash her very carefully, but I think she'll clean up nicely.  And as I was showing her to my husband, look at who I spied on the quilt...

Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck!   

And Goofy, riding a horse!

I wasn't sure that this was feed sack fabric, but after doing a little research, I found that yes, they did make vintage feed sack fabric featuring Disney characters!  And while we're looking at the quilt up close, do you notice the red quilting lines?  Imagine being so confident of your stitching you would stitch it in red!  It's just one more thing that makes me love this quilt.

So I am now the proud owner of three, yes three! vintage quilts!  

So - - - can I get a whoop whoop?

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And now it's your turn!

What's got you whooping it up this week?  

What's making you do a little happy dance?

Share!  We want to dance right along with you,

And it's always more fun to dance with friends!  

The party will stay open until Sunday midnight.  

Hope to see you there!

Hugs!

Sarah

Can I Get a Whoop Whoop? Vintage Quilt Restoration is DONE!

Hi, all!

Friday!  One of my favorite days of the week!  The weekend is starting, fun times with the grandkids are on the horizon, more time with my hubby - but I get to start it by whooping it up with you guys!  I hope you're ready to get started - let's go!

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A while ago, my friend Shea asked if I could take a look at her grandmother's quilt and see if I could repair it.  I told her yes, and we set up a time to meet.  When she brought her quilt over, she told me how her grandmother had made it and it had been well-loved by their family for years.  Well, she was right - it had been VERY well-loved!  It needed lots of repair work...

...but because this was such an important quilt to her, I agreed to see what I could do to stabilize and repair it.

Fortunately, as you can see in some of the pictures above, her grandmother had used a blanket as the batting layer.  That blanket was in pretty good shape, except for a couple of places, and had essentially held the quilt together.  The backing was also in very good shape, with only one small hole.  

The first step was to go over the quilt with a fine-toothed comb.  To that end, I folded the quilt in eighths and examined each section carefully.  I repaired the smaller areas, usually by re-stitching a seam or two, and marked the areas that needed new fabric with a bright post-it note pinned to the area. By the time I had checked over the entire quilt top, it looked like this...

Looks like lots of repair work in my future!  Fortunately, I had a box full of feed sack fabric scraps at hand, so I was able to make replacement patches with fabric of the same age as that in the original quilt.  

If you've ever worked on old quilts, you'll know that the pieces are seldom still the same shape they started out!  Everywhere I needed to replace a piece, I cut one slightly larger and turned the edges under as I hand sewed it into place.  Many many of these and many hours later, and I was happy to say the patching was finished!  

That left the binding.  The original binding was sadly frayed in many spots, so it couldn't stay as it was.  I elected to re-bind the quilt over the original binding, but wanted it to look like the original.  This quilt had been finished by turning the back over the front for binding, so it was rather wide.  I ended up cutting a 4" wide strip of muslin and folding it in half, then machine sewing it to the back of the quilt, matching the raw edge to the edge of the quilt and using a 1/4" seam.  When I turned the folded edge over to the front, it covered the wide original binding.  Then it was time for hand-sewing the binding down!  I haven't done that on a whole quilt in a long time, and it seemed like it took forever, but I finally finished it on Thursday in time to get some good pictures!

I'm really pleased to see that the patches I added don't stick out visually...

...probably because of this quilt's rather random arrangement!

This picture makes me think of the scene in "Seven Brides for Seven Brothers" when all the brides are dressed in winter skirts made of old quilts!

See what I mean about random?  But I see at least four patches that I replaced in the section above...

And it looks like it's holding together well - so much better than when I first received it!

Here you can see the new binding - I think it turned out well!

And the back of the binding turned out well, too!

I kind of like that you can see the blanket through the backing!

And I found one tiny hole on the back, about the size of the tip fo my pinkie, so I figured a little muslin heart appliquéd over it would add a little whimsy!  

So what did I learn throughout this process?  It pays to have feed sack scraps on hand.  I was lucky enough to find a truly ugly feed sack quilt top at a yard sale, made with very large pieces of fabric so I had some good stuff to work with.  I also used quilting thread, the kind that feels stiff and sort of waxy, to do all the hand stitching.  It worked well, didn't tangle as I stitched, and is very strong.  And I was careful to keep track of my time as I worked!  I actually spent more time than I would have anticipated repairing this quilt, so if you are repairing one for pay, you need to do that.

And here's one more whoop whoop worthy photo for the day...

All that yard work is paying off!  Look at my pretty pots of day lilies!  I'm not very good at growing things, so it's always a whoop-worthy moment when I keep something alive....

So - - - can I get a whoop whoop?

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And now it's your turn!

What's got you whooping it up this week?

What's making you do a little happy dance this week?

Share!  We want to dance right along with you,

And it's always more fun to dance with friends!

The party will stay open until Sunday midnight.

Hope to see you there!

Hugs!

Sarah

Make-A-List Monday - The End is In Sight!

Hi, all!

Here we are at Monday again!  And May, to boot - how in the world did that happen?  My grandkids tell me they only have thirteen days of school left, but it only seems like a few months ago that they were starting the school year!  Oh well, there's always summer fun to look forward to, right?

Let's see how last week's list went...

1.  Definitely work on the vintage quilt!

I was SUCH a good quilter this week - I made some serious progress on this project!  Here's where I was at the beginning of the week...

All those pink post-it notes are spots where I need to appliquéd a new piece of fabric.

And this is how it looked yesterday afternoon!  Today I wiped out most of the spots on the lower left and a couple on the right - I've only got about five left to do tomorrow.

2.  Finish the solids HST quilt top.

Done!  I love love love the way this came out!

3.  Quilt the Hygge Sparkle Pop quilt.

Done!  This was so much fun to quilt - you can see more pictures of the quilting on this blogpost.

4.  More yard work - unfortunately mulch won't spread itself!

Well, I got the planter weeded, the landscape cloth laid out, and the mulch spread - but ran out of mulch about two bags shy!  I've got more now, so tomorrow will see this bed finished.

5.  Keep up with any quilt ministry needs that come up.

Done!  We gave away a few quilts this week..

This quilt is going to a gentleman recently diagnosed with cancer....

This quilt is going to a woman battling a serious blood infection...

And this quilt is going to a teenager who was just diagnosed with a brain tumor.

So not a bad week, all in all!  I also made this pillow using an orphan block - some straight line quilting and an envelope back and binding, and it's done!

And here's what I'm planning on working on this week...

1.  Finish the repairs on the vintage quilt.

2.  Cut out a hopscotch quilt for the kids.

3.  Work on sorting one of the scrap tubs.

4.  Hands2Help administrative work.

5.  More yard work!

6.  Keep up with any quilt ministry needs that come up.

I really want to get the vintage quilt finished this week - I have so many projects I want to work on right now, and with that one out of the way, I can do them without guilt!  

So now, the question is - - - what are YOU working on this week?

Hugs!

Sarah

Can I Get a Whoop Whoop? Vintage Reclaimed!

Hi, all!

Can you believe that it's Friday already?  And the first Friday of summer, to boot!  Well, we all know what that means - it's time for us to get our whoop whoop on!  Are you ready?  Let's get started!


But before we get started, here's a HUGE WHOOP - there's a fix for the Blogger comment problem!!  Go to this blogpost and follow the directions she provides - I've already done it and it works!!!  HALLELUJAH!!!!

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Several months ago, a friend of mine brought me a top that her grandmother had made.  She had fond memories of it from her childhood and wanted to know if it could be repaired so she could use it again...

This was a really big coverlet - about queen size - and in pretty rough shape, so I couldn't get a picture of the whole top laid out.  This was the best I could do!  The top was raw edges on the back, no batting or backing.

Cute turtles, right?  They were appliquéd on all manner of fabrics - cottons, polyester double-knit, even lining fabric.  The lining fabric didn't hold up so well when my friend washed the top before bringing it to me.  Neither did that green fabric bordering each of the blocks.

My friend loved the gingham, but it was faded a lot, and in patches, so we decided to replace it with new red gingham.  We also needed to replace the green fabric, which was a loose weave that didn't hold up well, and my friend chose a blue chambray.

Lots and lots of frog-stitching (does it count as frog-stitching if you didn't do the original stitching?) and I had the gingham and green fabrics off of the turtle four-patch blocks.  That was when I realized that the four-patch blocks weren't square, or even the same sizes!  So I took them apart, squared up the turtles to the same size, and appliquéd some of those turtles to new fabric where their background blocks were frayed or damaged.  Whew!  That's better!

And here's the completed top, spread out on my queen-size bed.  When I quilted it, I used a wide flannel instead of batting, so it has weight, but not thickness.  It's actually more like the bedspread it was originally, just without the raw edges.  Quilting is a random meander everywhere except over the turtles.

Here you can see the backing I found at that great Joann's sale a little while ago - isn't it perfect?

I really do love the way this turned out!  There's something so satisfying about taking an old and well-loved piece and turning it back into something useful.  I hope this will last for many years to come, and allow my friend's grandchildren to form a whole new set of fun memories surrounding it!

So - - - can I get a whoop whoop?

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And now it's your turn!

What's got you whooping it up this week?

via GIPHY

What's making you do a little happy dance?

Share!  We want to dance right along with you!

And it's always more fun to dance with friends!

The party will stay open until Sunday midnight.

Hope to see you there!!

Hugs!

Sarah

SaveSave

Can I Get A Whoop Whoop? A Little Progress...

Hi, all!

Well, it's a good thing that you don't have to have a finish for this linky party, or I'd be in a world of hurt this week!  So will you join me in celebrating little accomplishments today?  It's Friday, and time to do some whooping - so let's get started!

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While I didn't get a lot done this week (that I can show, at least!), I did quilt this pretty top made by my friend Dolores.  It was nice to work on something so cheerful!

AND I did manage to reconstruct some of the turtle blocks for the vintage quilt I'm working on restoring.  These little guys are so cute, but they need a lot of work!  It's going to be a great quilt when it's finished, though.

And I got to spend Tuesday at the Nashville Zoo with these three (and my daughter!)  We had a lot of fun checking out all the animals and enjoying the beautiful sunny day.  And I learned that the old joke about how porcupines make love (very carefully) is TRUE!

A little Culver's for lunch and a bunch of monkeyshines (Emmy let out a PRODIGIOUS burp and made the whole restaurant laugh out loud!) ended our fun day!

So - - - can I get a whoop whoop?

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And now it's your turn!

What's making you whoop it up this week?

What's making you do a little happy dance?

Share!  We want to dance right along with you,

And it's always more fun to dance with friends!

The party will stay open until Sunday midnight.

Hope to see you there!

Hugs!

Sarah