Threads of Memory BOM Coming to a Close

Threads of Memory Sampler by Rosemary Youngs

Over on my Civil War Quilts blog we've been doing a free Block of the Month called Threads of Memory on the theme of the Underground Railroad and the history of slavery. The history

may be serious but the fabric choices are fun.

Above: Rosemary has set the January to October blocks with a Flying Geese set. The stars are all new designs based on traditional patchwork.

See the blog here:

http://civilwarquilts.blogspot.com/

Suzie at Oz Farmer is planning to use the same set

with the blocks she's made from my Voysey reproduction

prints Morris Modernized.

BeeJayM at the half way point.

The blocks began on the last Saturday of January, 2014

and will go till the last Saturday of December.

Model-maker Becky Brown has been making two sets of blocks each month. She designed

the Flying Geese set for one group of blocks.

Here's her spiky triangles sashing idea for the other set.

She'll alternate different stars.

When Jean Stanclift made these blocks

a few years ago we used a 

stars-in-the-sashing set.

The Civil War Quilts group has been meeting informally through the blog and our Flickr pages. I design the blocks and maintain the blog, Becky Brown and Dustin Cecil make the models. Dustin maintains the Flickr page.

Inspired by Becky's skills at fussy cutting you can

see a real style has developed in the group.

SylvieD

And then there is Dustin's set done only in tickings.

See more blocks and stripes at this post:

http://civilwarquilts.blogspot.com/2014/04/yipes-stripes.html

I must say the group works very well together. Each new Block of the Month we do (or Block of the Week) inspires some very creative uses of fabric and set designs.

Terry's designed her own set. This is Block 10

Britain's Star.

She's going to put each of the stars I designed

into another star. Quite clever.

Sheila is thinking about strips

of leftovers.

Keep your eyes on our Flickr page:

https://www.flickr.com/groups/threadsofmemory/

What's the plan for next year? Stay tuned.

QuiltMania Comes to Visit

Last month I got a phone call from France. QuiltMania editor

Carol Veillon was on her way to the Houston quilt market.

 Could she drop by to interview me?

This Friday????

I corralled some willing friends (fans of the magazine) to help dress the set

at the new house.

We hung our Paducah prize-winning dog quilt.

Quilts everywhere...

After a flurry of activity things looked pretty good.

Carol was primarily interested in my antique quilt collection.

They photographed a few reproduction quilts.

Here is photographer Guy working with one of Roseanne's Smith's

star quilts.

Combination Log Cabin/Crazy about 1900

The new living room became a photography studio.

Is this not a fabulous quilt? I've got room to hang a lot of quilts now.

Zig-Zag quilt of 60 degree diamonds, about 1915.

I never get to see these so it was great to see them up.

Carol and I went through the quilt closet.

Deb and Linda hung quilts and Deb photographed.

Here's a mid-19th century ten-pointed star.

Pretty soon all was in gorgeous disarray

But we all had fun, including Dottie Barker.

We are planning the article for spring, 2015

See QuiltMania's English page here:

http://www.quiltmania.com/english/home.html

See more about the reproduction Birds in the Air quilt in the last photo here:

http://barbarabrackman.blogspot.com/2014/08/backstitch-at-national-quilt-museum-in.html

My Fabric in Quilts I Didn't Make (yet)

Sister's Paint Box 

by Carla at Cora Quilts 

Carla had two packs of Moda precuts: My repro line Metropolitan Fair and Paint Box by Edyta Sitar for Laundry Basket Quilts.

She was pleased to see how well they complemented each other so she

used them to make this quilt from a how-to by Bonnie Hunter. I love her binding

of the stripe from Metropolitan Fair.

The pattern has several names. BlockBase says

Sister's Choice  and Greek Cross from the Kansas City Star

plus

New England Block.

The BlockBase numbers are 1802a

1802b

1802c

(Don't forget the "a" when you type in a numerical query)

See Carla's post here:

http://coraquilts.blogspot.ca/2014/03/sisters-paint-box-quilt.html

And the Woolen Needle has a pattern and

a kit for the quilt they call Ladies' Aid 

using another variation of the vintage pattern.

They chose my fabric line

Ladies' Album.

And it looks like #8280-17 is the border print

I'm guessing she used this two-block variation of the same design:

BlockBase #1001, commonly called Snowball.

See more about the quilt here:

http://www.thewoolenneedle.com/quiltkits.html

Jan Hutchison framed a medallion as a presentation

quilt using a chintz print from my Lately Arrived from

London collection a few years ago.

Check her blog post where you can see the masterful quilting better.

http://thesecretlifeofmrsmeatloaf.blogspot.com/2012/09/thank-you-madame-president.html

Elbe Herbert Johnson's Sampler

Elbe's Sampler

Collection of the Sanibel Historical Museum & Village

Willow Ann snapped this picture of a wonderful turn-of-the-20th-century sampler when she was in Florida. See her post here:

http://www.unfinishedquilter.com/blog/category/travel

Here's a link to the Museum:
http://www.sanibelmuseum.org/

The initials are EHJ for Elbe Herbert Johnson, whose first name was pronounced LB. He was born in Traverse City, Michigan in 1887, so we can guess the quilt was made some time between 1887 and 1907 or so, while he was growing up.

The images are fanciful and familiar.

Perhaps the goblet hopes the Elbe will be temperate.

The flag and Christian cross speak of other hopes.

Knox County, Ohio grave

of Elbe (1887-1967) and Bertha Beckwith Johnson

Elbe grew up to be a physicist who was on the faculty at Ohio's Kenyon college for 41 years. He retired to Danville, Ohio, where he is buried. He seems to have had a long and successful life.

His quilt is in a popular turn-of-the-century style

for samplers. Quilters combined blocks of

different sizes in rather disorganized fashion...

as in these three samplers from the same period.

Elbe's is unusual in it's variety of images and in the building in the center.

One might consider the center block a schoolhouse

but with two stories and two bay windows it

looks like a Queen Anne-style Victorian house...

Perry Hannah house Traverse City, Michigan

something in good supply in Traverse City.

Perhaps the house in the quilt was Elbe's home.

Minick and Simpson, Austin Bluebird Sampler, 2014

Polly and Laurie have captured the circa 1900 sampler style in their Austin Bluebird Sampler.

Here's a link to more about their pattern:

http://minickandsimpson.blogspot.com/2014/06/austin-bluebird-sampler.html