Besides being a quilter, I am a "writer". I love to write stuff of all sorts and have tried to write a lot of memories from my childhood while I can still remember them! So one day I happened to be looking at quilt blocks and several of the names made me think of stories about my family and myself. Quilt blocks have such interesting names, that you can't help but think of stories to go with them! I wrote all the stories I thought of and then decided to make a quilt based on those stories.
It's been a couple years since I last worked on these, so I dragged out all the ones I had done and have recently added several new ones. This may take me years to finish.....or I may finish it this year...who knows?? Some stores were obvious....like this block...."Broken Dishes". I wrote about a time when I dropped my sister's toy tea set while asking her if I could play with them....oops! The dishes in question were in the "blue willow" pattern, so that made the fabric choice for this one easy. I am choosing my fabrics to fit the stories, so there is no "rhyme or reason" or unifying theme in the fabrics. Should be a real colorful quilt when I finish it! LOL
"Card Trick"......our family has always played cards. Mostly euchre. So writing about all the card playing I did over the years was easy. I chose the colors of a deck of cards.
"Chain"....I made a slight variation to the design of this block, but it fits the story. My father was a surveyor and we were his survey helpers. Our job was to hold the red and white striped rod very straight (the center of my block), and to take charge of the "dumb end" of the chain (used to measure distances).....thus the connection to the block name.
"Crosses and Losses".....everyone has these.
My fabrics were chosen to represent a very close friend who died of cancer, and a beloved cat who died of feline leukemia.
"Grandmother's Flower Garden".....this was the block that started my story writing. My grandmother was known for her flower garden and I have a lot of memories of it. I have actually made another quilt that was also themed to her garden. (see my side bar for the quilt with the garden ball....my first crazy quilt) I'm not sure how I will use this block yet. I might make another one and sew them both to a background square.
"Hit and Miss". This was unusual and I found it in an old quilt book. It may actually refer to a type of quilt, rather then a block....what we would now call a "crumb quilt".....but the name was too good to not use for a story. It reminded me of being taught to shoot a gun and our job of keeping the birds out of the cherry trees! So birds and cherries for the fabrics. Not sure I like that bar of fabric at the bottom and may change it before I put this in the quilt.
"Housewife"....one of two blocks that will represent my mother. The fabrics show clothes hanging on the line, pies and other cooking stuff, and sewing items. That was how my mom spent most of her day!
"The House That Jack Built".....this is for my father, whose nickname was "Jack". I had never seen this block before and I have since seen it done slightly differently. Will have to do some research and maybe have to remake it.....but I doubt that I will. Many quilt blocks have more than one name, and one name is used for many quilt blocks. So variations are normal. The blue fabrics are to represent the plaid shirts he wore, and I believe that blue was his favorite color.
"Ocean Waves".....just a block about my love of the ocean.
"Tippecanoe".....another block for my father. This one tells the story of an "ill-fated" canoe trip on the Milan River with my husband, where they ended up in the water and Mike had to pull dad out.
"Tea Party".....this block apparently goes by many names. I chose the Tea Party name, because I love tea and beautiful tea cups.
"Corn and Beans"......my early life revolved a lot around corn and beans....and tomatoes, and peas, and cucumbers, and every other veggie you can name! We had large gardens and our daily jobs were to plant, weed, pick, and prepare veggies for mom to can. I had to hunt hard to find a green bean fabric, but finally found one a couple years ago!
"Next Door Neighbor"....the story of my first best friend, Vicky. We grew up next door to each other and were always together until she moved away. We met up again in high school. Then we didn't see each other for over 30 years. I found her again on the internet and we were able to meet in Nashville, IN one summer when she came to Indiana for a family wedding. We found out we are both quilters! We always knew we had so much in common :-) We visited a quilt store and she bought me one of these fabrics that has sayings about friendship on it. I found the Best Friends fabric in another store, and the cat fabric is because we were always playing with our cats.
" Steps to the Altar".....this is an odd looking block when used by itself, and I have seen it made slightly different, so I may change it. This is the block representing my faith story through the years. The pastel colors represent the windows of the church I grew up in, and the white for confirmation and communion, and the red for both the carpet and wine.
"Sister's Choice".....I have two sisters, so there will be two blocks eventually. This one was for my sister Dorothy. She bought me both of those fabrics for a lap quilt I made her and I know she likes red colors, as shown in all the red oriental carpets that she has on the walls of her house. I'm not totally happy with how the two fabrics work together...may change...may not. Maybe I'll ask her! My other sister is going to send me fabric for her block.
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I have more stories and more blocks to make.....I have been working on "Sunshine and Shadows", and am ready to work on "Lover's Knot" for my story with Mike, and I have ideas for "Spools"...another block for my mom and my own sewing as well! There are others.....this may be a large quilt when done :-) Do our stories ever end?? I would like to make blocks for my children, but haven't come up with pattern names that seem to tell their stories yet.
I have some vague ideas about how I will put them all together. I have always loved reading books....another story of my life that I wrote about! So I will probably use some sashing blocks that look like stacks of books and will put names of old favorites on them. I also love cats....and will use some cat blocks to help connect blocks of different sizes. I've even toyed with the idea of some silhouettes of people on the quilt......we'll see! My story is still unfolding!
