Quilts Revisited: The Vintage Dresden Plate Quilt

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.

Green strings

In my neverending quest to turn scraps into useful things, I've had some fun making string-blocks out of scraps. 

It's really satisfying to turn a pile of this ...

... into a little something like this! 

Next up, this one will get some borders and become a baby quilt for a friend.

A Finished Quilt!

A few months ago, this quilt got finished!

I really enjoyed putting this quilt together. It was mostly pieced a couple of years ago. (I blogged about it a few times ... including here, here, and here. It seems like I started blogging about this one in 2016 - including posts like this one.)

It's my version of "Hopscotch Butterscotch" from Bonnie Hunter's book Adventures With Leaders and Enders.

This quilt has the look that I like to call the "organized scrappy" look ... lots of scraps come together to make a great design. It's a scrappy quilt, and even the fabrics that "shouldn't" go together can look good together. They just work. 

To me, this is one of the reasons why quilts sometimes seem like life: a lot of little parts come together to make the whole, and a lot of surprises may come our way. In life, we can't always see what God's up to, but He has a plan, and He works out all things together for good for those who love Him. 

I love pieced backings on quilts! 

A little extra patchwork gives the back of the quilt its own special look.

The quilting was an all-over stippled design ... it's my favorite.

Straight-line quilting in the border adds a little more definition.

This quilt was a gift for a dear friend. 

25-Patch Quilt Top!

The quilt top is done!

25-Patch blocks alternated with Mosaic neutral blocks.

Those white-and-cream blocks ... Are they "made fabric" blocks? Yes! Are they "scrap vortex" blocks? Yes! Not sure what to call them. But I love them!

This quilt top even looks cool from the BACK! 

From the back, it reminds me of a stained-glass window. (Which reminds me ... I have a couple kinds of stained-glass window quilts that I'd love to make!)

Whatever Wednesday

Here's my Wednesday report on random projects:

This crumb quilt is nearly ready for quilting. It's a baby quilt for a friend. It needs a border, and the backing needs a patchwork insert to bring it up to size. I'm planning on black-and-white striped binding.

 

All 32 of my 25-patch blocks are ready, and all 31 of my neutral "made fabric" (a.k.a. "scrap vortex") blocks are ready. I'm starting to assemble them! It should make a twin-size quilt.

  

 

The Pumpkins quilt top is done -- I love the look of it with the borders on! Next up, I need to tweak the backing so it's the right size, and then ... quilting!

  

In knitting news, I realized I haven't yet posted a picture of the finished purple socks.

 And, since early May, I've been working on a new pair of socks.

And, in the "whatever" category, I've been trying to add some color to my flowerbeds, so these clearance items from Lowe's should help!

  

I'm linking this post to this week's Whatever Wednesday at Jo's Country Junction.

25-patch quilt in progress

This has been one of my recent projects ...

Beautiful coordinating fabrics cut into little squares ...

Lots of assembling of 25-patches ...

Did I mention lots of assembling? I've got 30 blocks; need 32.

Here's a look at my layout: 25-patches, with scrap-vortex-style neutral blocks in between.

And the paper version of the layout ...

More pictures soon!

Whatever Wednesday ... on Thursday ... Whatever!

One of my favorite blogs has a link party to report progress on projects. It used to be just for quilts ("UFO Challenge"); now it's for whatever sorts of projects are in progress ("Whatever Wednesday"). The link party is a great reminder to keep little bits of progress happening!!

I'm late posting, since it's no longer Wednesday, but here goes:

I've been trying to finish some quilting projects. This is good, because I'm constantly brainstorming new ways to use up fabric scraps (read: I'm constantly starting new projects!).

This week, I finally finished quilting the 1008 Squares quilt. 

I even cut binding for it yesterday, and put the binding on today! 

 

I started this one a long time ago. 

I blogged about starting it over three years ago. 

It quickly progressed to being a quilt top. 

More recently, it finally got borders. 

And, and it feels good to be getting it done. I'm loving the striped binding!

Also, in the past few days, I finished assembling the pumpkins part of the Pumpkins quilt top.

(The Pumpkins quilt was previously blogged here and  here.) The first border is on. Next up: the patchwork border! 

To make this a reversible quilt, my super-scrappy rendition of "Connect Four" (blogged here) is ready to be the quilt back. It still needs a plain border to bring it up to size. 

And, in my neverending quest to sew up some of my fabric, I started some 25-patches in muted colors. Lots of little squares!

 

So, that's my quick rundown of (some of) what I've been working on.

I'm linking this post to this week's "Whatever Wednesday" at Jo's Country Junction. 

UFO Challenge

I'm working to finish some projects, so this started happening last weekend: 

Quilting on the Hopscotch Butterscotch quilt ... I made the pieced back for it last week.

In the interest of full disclosure, some of this happened, too! Oops.

In other news, I'm working on the back for my pumpkins quilt. 

I had sewn a little a few weeks ago, working lots of scraps (and leftovers from another project -- see the end of this post) into my plan.

Got that quilt back done!

(Inspiration: "Connect Four" quilt pattern from the book "Country Girl Modern" by Jo Kramer and Kelli Hanken ... I changed it up a lot, to use the scraps and sizes I have, but the concept is similar, and their design was my inspiration for this one.)

As I work on my UnFinished Objects, it's a great help to have a weekly link party as a check-in -- it keeps me motivated to have something to share, and it's fun to see what other quilters are working on.

My post is a little late (meant to post on Wednesday), but I'm linking it anyway -- to this week's UFO Challenge at Jo's Country Junction.