Grandmother's Fan quilt - an acquisition

When I was in Austin for QuiltCon, I heard that Danielle (@petitselefants) bought a beautiful antique quilt from a shop not too far away.  Antique quilts are few and far between in New Zealand so I had to investigate the shop (Uncommon Objects) and see for myself.  I ended up visiting twice - the first time I saw this quilt but didn't buy it, and I kept thinking about it all through QuiltCon.  On our very last day in Austin I stopped in and picked it up.  I couldn't resist! 

 

It's a beautiful grandmother's fan design, made with what are probably genuine 1930's fabrics, scalloped edging and a couple of interesting solid fabrics.

 

It's a pretty big quilt - the photo above is my brother and my dad holding it "landscape" because it was too long for them to hold it "portrait".  It's in amazingly good condition as well - there are a few places where the quilting has come undone but the fabrics are not particularly worn or stained.  The guy who sold it to me didn't know its provenance (and it doesn't have a label on it), but he thought the fabrics were from the 1930's and the quilt was probably made in the 1940's or 1950's.

 

The quilt appears to be pretty much entirely hand pieced, and it's definitely hand quilted.  That scalloped edging must have taken forever!

I could just stare at it for ages.  You can tell its really vintage - there are a few places where two pieces of the same fabric have been joined together (for example, to make a dresden blade), where the quilter obviously didn't have a single piece of fabric that was big enough.

Since this quilt has survived so long relatively undamaged, I'm keen to keep it in good condition (probably best not to let the cats claw it then).  My plan is to stitch a hanging sleeve to the back and then hang it in a space at the end of my hallway.  It doesn't really get any sun so it should be a good place for a quilt.

Have you ever bought a vintage or antique quilt?  What did you do with it?

Lil' Fox Cushion

One of the classes I'm teaching this year at Stitchbird is on foundation paper piecing.  We will be using Artisania's Lil' Fox pattern and students can turn their paper pieced fox into whatever they like. All the class details are here.

Of course, I had to make a class sample (as well as some step-outs to show in class).  I decided to use a few Cotton & Steel fabrics together with my old favourite, yarn dyed Essex Linen in Black (available here), for the sample.

I also used Cotton & Steel for the back of the cushion, and using my covered zipper tutorial to finish.

I thought simple would be better for the quilting, and went for a cross-hatch using a heavier weight thread again - I love the way the heavier thread stands out against the linen.  This one is Aurifil 2021 in 28 weight.

I'm not much good at embroidery so I stitched on some buttons for this the eyes and nose.  I think they give this guy some extra personality.

If you'd like to learn foundation paper piecing (and it is one of those things that is quite nice to learn from someone else), I hope you'll join me at Stitchbird.  Again, you can find all the class details here.

Caturday Wisdom #111

Some of us need more beauty sleep than others. Mila

 

I think I've just worked out why cats sleep so much.

This beauty is the sister of Mojo from last week. Luckily they have plenty of photos taken as Adrianne and I have been a bit slack on the cat-photo front lately, or maybe Ivy and Ralph haven't been getting enough sleep and it's been affecting their looks... (I'm joking Ralph. Please don't poop in my clothes.)

 

Sleep is looking like the theme of this weekend as both Adrianne and I are feeling a bit deprived and in need of a sleep in/nap/both. I will refer to the above photo for some sleepspiration. Is that a thing?

 

#year30quilt - an update

I'm nearing the halfway point of my year 30 quilt project, where I'm making a block every day for my 30th year.  I hit 169 blocks (a square number) over the weekend and took some progress photos.  I thought I might make it easier for people who haven't been watching the whole way through and share my progress photos right from the start in this post, you can see how the quilt has developed.

The first 16 blocks.

The first 44 blocks.

The first 73 blocks.

The first 121 blocks.

The first 169 blocks.

I think the quilt is still looking completely mad and I still love it.  When I look back at the blocks they remind me of what I was doing and feeling when I made them.  Even though I still have over 180 blocks to go, I'm pretty excited about seeing this quilt in its finished state!

If you're interested in this project, you can read my previous posts here:

- Creativity

- Update at 18 blocks

- Update at 44 blocks
- Update at 73 blocks
- Update at 121 blocks

QuiltCon Recap 2: The People

One of the highlights of QuiltCon for me was finally meeting lots of quilty bloggy friends in person.  A couple of people asked me what it was like meeting online friends in person, and whether people were different to the way they portrayed themselves online.  Without exception, everyone I met was either exactly the way they seem online or even nicer.  

I travelled to QuiltCon with my friend Anne (@ihaveafabricproblem), and we met fellow kiwis Rachel (@rachelwoodenspoon and Wooden Spoon Quilts) and Deb (@deb_trail and Deb's Doodlings) in San Francisco.

 

Last year Amanda from Everyday Fray visited New Zealand as part of a big trip with her husband.  They stayed at Rachel's place for one night and Anne and I caught up with them for dinner when they were in Wellington.

Amanda lives in the Bay Area and kindly offered to take us out on a bit of a fabric tour.  Since Anne from Play Crafts lives quite locally as well, we met at The Intrepid Thread and snapped this photo of us all together.  As well as The Intrepid Thread, we made a stop at Joann's (where I stocked up on lots of DS Quilts fabrics that you can't buy here) and a lovely quilt shop in Berkley called Stonemountain and Daughter.  We also had a tour of Berkley and yummy ice-cream sandwiches with warm cookies - it was a truly awesome day and I know I'll remember it for a long time to come.  Thank you Amanda, for being a wonderful tour guide and friend.

This is the all the fabric we bought between the four of us that day, laid out on my hotel room bed after we got back in the evening.  I'm not telling who bought what fabric!

In the lead up to QuiltCon, we managed to get ourselves added to the Aussie QuiltCon Contingent Facebook group (even though Australia and New Zealand ARE different countries - a common point of confusion apparently).  The Aussie girls were an absolute hoot and we met loads of them at their official (and very well organised) dinner the night before QuiltCon started.

I had a pretty full class-load, and I'll share more about the classes I took in another post.  However, in a rare moment of sanity, I deliberately left Friday completely free for checking out the quilts, perusing the vendor hall and meeting people.  I ran into Jess from Quilty Habit in the morning, and we just had to have a photo together.

 

Leanne from She Can Quilt is a long-time blogging friend so it was exciting to finally meet her in person.  We ended up spending a bit of time together, which was awesome.  Leanne has really developed her own quilting style and it was awesome to recognise her quilts in the show (one of which took out first prize for Minimalist Design).  I also had lunch with Leanne one day and we ended up sitting with Lee, Faith and Krista.  I was still trying to play it cool at that stage and didn't get a photo with them but it was lovely to meet them.  I gave up trying to pretend I was cool pretty quickly after that and started getting more photos with people!

 

Jess from Elven Garden Quilts is a really talented quilter and one of the sweetest people you'll meet.  We walked the vendor hall together and I decided to be Jess' PR person for the day.  It's far easier to talk someone else up than to talk yourself up, so I had a blast telling people how talented Jess is.

 

I kept running into Sarah (Stitching and Bacon) and then I realised that her awesome hand-made bag had cats on it, made out of cat fabric! Hello new friend!  We sat next to each other in a class as well and she is truly lovely.

 

I met Nicole from Mama Love Quilts for lunch on Friday and we spent the afternoon wandering the show as well.  We spent some time looking at the quilts but also spent a lot of time chatting to people!  Nicole's quilt also won a prize, taking second place in the Minimalist Design category.

 

I ran into Rossie at the show and she invited me to come to dinner with a group of her friends who were going to check out an area with a bunch of food trucks.  I'm so glad she invited me (umm and also that she knew who I was - thank you Rossie!), her friends were awesome, we saw the famous Austin bats which live under a bridge and come out at dusk, the food was delicious, I took my first Uber ride and we had ice-cream.  Fun times!

 

This is Dorie from Tumbling Blocks ordering ice-cream at Amy's, a quirky ice-cream place where the staff wore quirky hats and juggled ice-cream (not always successfully).  From memory, the others in the group were Maritza, Jenna, Sarah, Emily, Rebekah, Melissa and Cheryl.

 

Since we had five out of six Pinprov Bee members together, we had to take a photo.  From left to right, Alyce, me, Elisabeth, Gemma and Jess.  Together with Janice (Better off Thread), we have the most relaxed quilting bee and it was so nice to get to meet these girls that I feel like I've gotten to know so well over the last year or so.

On the last day of QuiltCon, Anne and I had an impromptu breakfast meet-up with Debbie from A Quilter's Table and Rachel from Snippets of Sweetness - so much fun.

Now that I'm back home and looking through these photos, it seems strange that I won't be seeing these friendly faces all the time.  I feel like I should be running into these quilty people at the fabric shop, or at guild meeting, or even in the supermarket.  I love living in New Zealand, but it does bring home just how far away from everywhere else we are.  I'm definitely prioritising more travel in the future!

There are loads of awesome people I spent time with at QuiltCon who I didn't manage to get a photo with and people who I wish I'd had more time to hang out with.  If you're not in this post, it's not because I didn't love meeting you, it's because I just couldn't include everyone (even though I would ship you all over here in a minute if I could!).  One of the hardest parts (for a confirmed introvert like me) was trying to balance the socialising with my need to have quiet time (and, you know, sleep).  I think I opted to socialise over quiet time and I definitely suffered for it one day when I really ran out of steam (this happened to most people at some stage which made me feel a bit better).

I will almost certainly be back at QuiltCon at some stage.  On one hand the move from a biennial event to an annual event is awesome, and I hope it means more people can attend.  On the other hand, I don't think there will be such a big international contingent at each QuiltCon, and a central point to meet quilty friends from around the world is definitely part of the appeal for me.

So, did you go to QuiltCon this year and are you planning to attend in future?  Even if you didn't get to QuiltCon, have you been to any quilting events where meeting people was one of the highlights?