1930s Irish Chain and Boston Commons: Hubby for the Win

 Welcome to Treadlestitches!  It's the last Saturday of the month, so time for a show and share of some antique quilts from my collection.

Some background information:  My husband and I don't like all the same things.  I love quilts and fabric and yarn, and he reads math books for fun.  (Seriously, he really does.  Can you imagine?)

We both like going to flea markets and antique malls, and along the way I have shamelessly bent his ear about antique quilts.  I didn't really think he was listening (I mean, am I listening when he talks math?), but apparently he was.

One day several years ago when I was busy, he went to an estate sale, and came back with this Irish Chain quilt.  He seemed a little worried about it, that maybe it wasn't something I'd want, but I soon cleared up that confusion!  It's a lovely 1930s quilt, hand quilted, in perfect shape.  It looks as though it's never been used.

He didn't get the maker's name, unfortunately, but we know the quilt was made right here in the town we live in.  There are only 4 fabrics in the quilt:  the print on the front, the print on the back, and two slightly different blue solids for the piecing and the binding.

I was a little bit afraid to ask how much it cost, but inquiring minds want to know, so I did.  He paid $25.00!!!  I might have cracked the house foundation jumping up and down.

With that success under his belt, he next came home with this Boston Commons quilt.  (It's even got purple, for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge color of the month!)

In this photo, you can see how the corners were done.  Also, there are solid purple squares and solid green squares surrounding the random scrap squares, with white as a background.  The edge is sort of a try at a scalloped border.

The white squares, all eleventy-million of them, were cut and sewn individually.

The back is white also, and the quilt has been machine quilted.  It has a very thin batting, maybe even a flannel sheet, which was common in the 1930s.  The condition is good, but not perfect.  There are a couple of places where seams have popped or raveled out.

This time, hubby knew he'd done well.  He got it for the low low price of $40.00.  

Both of these quilts are in this book:  Warman's Vintage Quilts, Identification and Price Guide, by Maggi McCormick Gordon.  I knew Maggi through the Wisconsin Museum of Quilts & Fiber Arts.  She came out one day and went had a lovely time going through my quilts and tops.  Many of the quilts in the book came from Wisconsin collectors.

My Boston Commons quilt even made the back cover!

So many thanks to my dear hubby for finding these lovely ladies of the past.

I've often thought I'd like to make a Boston Commons quilt, but I'm not sure how difficult it would be.

I bought this classic book back when I was fairly new to quilting.  It's The Boston Commons Quilt, by Blanche and Helen Young, copyright 1983.  The cardboard templates kind of scared me off.  I kept the book anyway, hoping I'd figure it out someday.

Recently I saw a fun quilt in this book, Easy Layer-Cake Quilts 2, by Barbara Groves and Mary Jacobson of Me and My Sister Designs.

It's called Around the Block, and isn't exactly a Boston Commons, but it's similar, and made with scraps, which I love.  I might have to adjust it a little to get the look I want.

Here's the piecing diagram from the book.  Maybe it wouldn't be too complicated if I took it a row at a time?

With July coming quickly to an end, I had to get this purple crayon made to go with the other RSC blocks. 

There are so many different shades of purple!  These crayons have yummy names like Grape and Wild Berry.

In other news, we went camping in the Wisconsin Dells last weekend.  Whenever I go camping, it rains, and this was no exception.  We had a huge thunderstorm, but we were safe and dry in our cabins.  This is my favorite way to camp, no more tents for me!

All of our kids and grandkids were able to come, and we had such a good time.  This is only part of the family contingent.  The guy in the middle with the red shirt is my hubby, formerly Quilt Buyer Extraordinaire.  He's retired from that job now that I've stopped actively collecting, and is resting on his laurels.

If you go to the Dells, you are almost required to take a ride on a Duck boat, an amphibious vehicle that dates to World War II.  This is the view of the Wisconsin river, just before our driver drove us right into it.  We made a big splash, and the kids loved it.

How was your week?  I hope you had time for fun, family, and quilting.

Thanks for reading,

Sylvia@Treadlestitches

Just a note--I know I'm going to be too busy this coming week to get a blog written by the weekend.  So I'll be back on the blog Aug. 12-13.  In the meantime, Happy Quilting!

Linking up with:

Alycia at Finished or Not Finished Friday

Angela at So Scrappy 

 

 

New Month, New Goals, Still Red

Welcome to February!  Around here, we're really glad to see the end of January with its terrible cold.  Thursday morning it was -24 degrees (minus 24!) when I got up.  Right now it's 36 degrees ABOVE ZERO, and it seems like a heat wave.

My goal for the OMG this month is hand quilting this little quilt.  It's made of redwork squares I bought at the Cedarburg Maxwell Street Days flea market several years ago.

I started quilting it in January of 2016 (one hundred years after this block was made!), and kind of ran out of steam.  I have a little arthritis in my hands, which was my excuse for stopping work on it, but I have found that using my hands more actually helps them work better.

Maybe making this my goal will push me to finally get it done.  These little squares deserve to be finished, not just languishing in my closet for another year or two.

In other news, we got a new color for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge--yellow!  That should brighten up the sewing room this month!  While I was waiting for the next color to be announced, I quilted last month's blocks (seen above).

I'm doing these quilt-as-you-go style.  It's really easy to quilt one block at a time.  I still need to decide on/find a sashing fabric, but I can do that closer to the end of the year.  The batting is cut from my giant bin of batting scraps.  There will be some hand work on the back to finish the quilt, but I find that kind of pleasant.

Here's the back.  I bought the whole 6 yard bolt of this neutral, and I'm hoping it will be enough.  If not, I'll just make fewer blocks or smaller borders or something.  Yeah, I'm kind of winging it here.

One consequence of the cold weather was less babysitting for me, since my daughter and son-in-law got some days off.  So I finished quilting this top, a small version of Bonnie Hunter's Happily Scrappily Irish.  Bella the dog loves it.

This is the year of trying new things!  My new thing here is hanging diamonds quilting.  Hanging diamonds is a sort of grid, with one set of lines going straight up and down, and a second set of lines going diagonally.  It's a very old style, often seen on antique quilts.  And now on my quilt!
BTW, there are little squares of yellow in almost all the blocks.

I'm not as happy with the border quilting.  I didn't do the best job marking it (ran out of Golden Threads paper and just marked with soap) so it's a tad wobbly.  It's another old fashioned design, a six-strand cable.

Neutral repro back, and red binding, and that's it.  I made the top in the first place to use up my 2 in. wide strips of repro/traditional scraps.  And are they used up?  Well, at least I can close the drawer now.

In 2018, I kept lots of lists of my quilting, just to try to keep my projects on track.  One list was Tops Made, with a place to add the date the top was quilted.  Three twin-sized tops were turned in to the charity committee at my local quilt group to be long arm quilted for folks in need.  The rest were quilted by me, on my lovely Mrs. Pfaff.
This Irish Chain top was the last one to be quilted from that list.  This means that every top I finished last year is now a finished, useful quilt.
Now, what about the backlog?  Maybe there will be some snow days in our future?  (Just kidding, I'm not really wishing for more snow.)

Having thoroughly used red in January, I am looking forward to digging into the yellow scraps this month.
I'm wishing bright scraps and bright thoughts for you this week.
Cheers for reading,
Sylvia@Treadlestitches

Linking up with
Angela at Soscrappy
Patty at Elm Street Quilts One Monthly Goal
Myra at Busy Hands Quilts 
Sarah at Can I Get A Whoop Whoop 
Cynthia at Oh Scrap