Month: June 2019

Some awesome Quilting news…

The Uncle Donald Quilt goes to the Ohio History Museum, along with my grandmother’s.

What?  Holy Cow. 

Several weeks ago, a lady form the Ohio History Museum spoke at our guild meeting.  She talked about quilts up to about 1950.  I was not looking forward to this speaker, but it turned out that she was very knowledgeable about quilting and historical quilts.  In her presentation, she showed many lovely old quilts.  She explained that most of their quilts were donated and cam with the history attached to them.

When it was question time, I asked if they had any early quilts that were made by men.  She told me no they had never came across anything like that.  Once she was done speaking I showed her a photo of Uncle Donald’s quilt.  Right away she asked me if I would consider donating it. I would.  SO, she asked me to send her an email with any information I had.

That was easy.  I knew Uncle Donald, and he was one of my favorite people.  After he died I continued to visit Aunt Helen a couple for times a year.  We would go to lunch and talk about all sorts of things.  I often took her something I made when I visited.  Once time when I was there she gave me the “Uncle Donald Quilt”.   

I had no idea if he was illiterate.  My dad thought he was a pretty smart man, and I image her was, even if he was not educated.  I know my grandmother was, she was actually a school teacher at one point in her life, but boys became valuable farm hands and were often not educated past the 8th grade.

My Grandmother’s (Monnie) quilt

Uncle Donald had 8 sisters (one of them being my grandmother).  Since he was the youngest, he wound up joining in on the quilting.  He made his own quilt.  Aunt Helen thought I should have it, since he was my family. 

So I had all the provenance and sent her the information I knew.  She emailed me back information about my family after she researched them.  I had guessed the quilt was from about 1920, but was unsure.  I knew when my grandmother was born, but did not know that until Donald was born in 1907.  She thought that 1920 was pretty close because the 1920 census had listed him as an illiterate farmer.  He would have been 13 then and become a valuable farm worker and likely not had time for quilting after that.

So, my Uncle Donald Quilt will be part of the Ohio History Museum’s quilt collection, along with one of my grandmother’s.  Uncle Donald’s quilt will be the only one made by a man in the collection.

It feels very good to know that items from my family will be forever saved as part of a historical collection.

It takes about a year for things to be officially added to the collection along with filling out paperwork, but I am thrilled it will be forever saved.

Happy Sewing

Happy Quilting

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What did I do this weekend?

I know you are all dying to know.  LOL. I made this baby quilt top.  I have some fat quarter packs that I have received as gifts and was trying to find a good way to use them.  I still have a few things to work out, but overall came out kind of cute.  I guess I find anything with dog fabric kind of cute though.  Good way to use five fat quarters.  I made a few mistakes in piece sizes because I forgot to properly account for seam allowance, but I think I have it figured out now.

I made the mistake of not putting all the pieces on the design board, so I have some fabrics together that I don’t like, but I will not make that mistake next time.

So, the Connecting Threads warehouse was this past weekend, in Columbus, Ohio.  SO I went, almost didn’t but then on my way home from something else, decided to check it out.  Glad I did and also glad I went in the afternoon.  Apparently there was a 2 hour wait to get in the building when they opened.  I am not patient and would not have waited for 2 hours to get in the building which was a warehouse with no air conditioning.  I don’t black Friday shop either.  I want/need nothing that bad.

There was still plenty of stuff for me.  I bought 18 yards of fabric @ $2.50/yd.  Pretty good.  I did have to stand in line for abut 30 minutes though.  I was a hot mess.  Next time, I make Haley go stand line immediately while I shop.  She tried to get me to go to the car and she would wait in line, but I toughed it out.

First picture is what I bought.  Second picture is the warehouse.  The fabric is on rolls, and there are rolls and rolls.  The third picture is the line which wrapped around the aisle of the warehouse and up another.  They also sold yarn there, lots of yarn.

Happy Sewing

Happy Quilting

My Table Setting and my Quilting Godmother

So, everyone needs a Quilting Godmother.  Seriously, mine listens to my problems (personal and quilt related), leads me down the path of good quilting and then ever so often a box of awesomeness arrives at my home.

I never thought when I created my blog that I would make real friends here, let alone find a quilting Godmother.  Who would have thought?  I have found so many awesome like minded people through my blog.  I am ever so grateful for the friendships and comradeship.  I really do love you all (Nanette…you have a special place in my heart).

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Look at all this wonderful stuff I got from my Quilting Godmother (LOL)  There are such beautiful things in this box, I can’t even tell you.

I love creating like this.  I will take these things and then like a puzzle put them together.  So besides the quilting challenge, I also have the figure out how to put it all together challenge.

About my table setting…Looks great from distance.  Don’t look to close.  For whatever reason, a preschooler with safety scissors must have cut these out.  The place mats did not go together well, mostly due to the cutting.  Cutting accurately is so important.  Learned that lesson again…..dang it.

Since these are for my table, I will tolerate their mediocrity.  I actually created these so I WaterMark_2019-06-04-15-16-00could practice quilting spirals.  I have a quilt that I want to do the spiral pattern on and wanted more practice.

It did not turn out too bad.   The practice was good.  I will feel better when I set out to quilt the big quilt with spirals.

20190601_193652This is my Snibble and all the reason my things frequently come complete with dog hair.  I had these laying on the back of the couch as I completed the binding.  She decided that she needed to watch me as I worked and plopped herself on top of them.

So, my mother was from Germany.  It turns out that growing up, there were some made up words in my family (by my mother).  Snibbles was one of them.  I grew up thinking that Snibbles were little bits of paper or fabric (scraps) because that is what my mother referred to them as (along with her best friend who was also from Germany).  I was frequently told to clean up my Snibbles.  I learned while I was in college that it was not really a word.  It was rush week (yes, I was a sorority girl)  and we were doing something that involved cutting paper.  I said “we are going to have to clean up all these snibbles”, as if that was a word everyone knew.  They all looked at me like I was crazy, so I repeated myself.  Then came the laughter and the realization that this was not really a word, but something my mother and Betty (Mom’s best friend, also from Germany..I see a pattern here)  made up.  My whole life up til then, I thought Snibbles were  a real thing.

Snibble is now a real thing.  My late Husband named her that because she was a “scrap” of a dog (he was very familiar with the Snibble story).  He was working for a farmer changing oil on tractors and their dog had 13 puppies.  Only one was a girl and the boys were being mean to her and not letting her eat.  He rescued her for me.  She was all bit up when she came, but is a wonderful happy girl now.

Happy Sewing

Happy Quilting

Treasure your Family and your Quilting Godmother!