So, I've realized that in my quilty blog, there are a ton of projects I've forgotten to blog about. Hence, I'll be posting occasionally in my "Quilts Revisited" series -- projects I'm revisiting because I didn't give them their moment on the blog when I finished them.
My great-great-grandmother's Dresden Plate quilt. I blogged about this quilt only a couple of times ... I was working on it in 2016 and blogged about it here, then briefly here in 2017. Then, here in 2018, I started to write about how I had finished it up in 2017.
Anyway, I never posted the finished pictures, so here they are. Behold, my great-great-grandmother's hand-pieced Dresden Plate quilt!
My great-great-grandmother, Minnie Belle Causbie Foreman, died before I was born. But she was known to be a wonderful quilter, and my mom inherited some of her finished quilts and some of her quilt tops.
A few years ago (ahem, 2013, but who's counting?), my mom sent me the four quilt tops she had inherited that needed to be quilted. We decided that machine-quilting would be the best thing, and my mom trusted me to do the quilting. Even though these vintage quilt tops were hand-pieced, none of us was ever going to hand-quilt them.
To begin with, I added an outer border since the quilt had none. For the border, I didn't find an exact match to the sashing color, but I decided to go a shade darker, and the effect is nice. I quilted each Dresden and all the sashings and borders with a swirly design that sort of echoes the swirly fabric I chose for the backing.
I do all of my quilting on a regular domestic sewing machine. As I've gotten more practice over the years, I enjoy the free-motion quilting process more and more.
After all my procrastinating on this one, the quilting went remarkably smoothly. I'm sure it helps that I'd practiced this quilting design on a couple of smaller projects first.
I really LOVE the vibrant colors in this quilt. Such variety!
In a way, it feels a little like I got to collaborate on a project with my great-great-grandmother, which is pretty awesome. She and I didn't get to meet each other, but I got to finish her quilt. How awesome is that?!
I quilted some wording into the border of the quilt, along with the dates my great-great grandmother lived ... it says, "Hand-pieced by Minnie Belle Causbie Foreman, 1871-1972."
My mom has been enjoying the quilt. I'm so glad that, after all these years, she gets to enjoy using this beautiful quilt top she inherited, since it's finished now.
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