Thursday, August 4, 2016

Antique inspiration at Maine Quilts

The other day my friend Karen and I headed up to Maine Quilts.  Such a nice show!  Long drive but lots of talking time, and the Kittery Outlets on the way home.

My favorite part of the show was this room of antique quilts, with miniature reproductions.  It was headed up by Wendy (theconstantquilter) and Cyndi, who blogged about the exhibit in detail here.   Check out her blog post - the quilts were amazing, and hers was just a masterpiece!

This is a detail from Wendy's "Burning Leaves" quilt, which won multiple ribbons.  You can see here that it is in the potholder style.  The felt hand (so pretty!) indicates hand quilting... and my oh my, what hand quilting!  



I came home inspired to step up my game in the hand quilting realm.  In the early 90's when I learned how to hand quilt, I used a hoop.  Then I quickly transitioned to simple machine quilting.  Now that I am back to doing some hand quilting, I haven't been using a hoop.  Fairly big, not-so-even stitches.  Time to reboot.  I ordered a hoop, and YET ANOTHER style of thimble, and have high hopes!  Thimbles, thimbles... I have tried so many. 

Meanwhile, 



My friend Carol was in town and



she brought me a large shopping bag PACKED with homespun goodness... 


She and her friends go to thrift stores for shirts and share what they find with each other.


I'm thinking... log cabin!  

9 comments:

  1. Oh what a great friend to have! Thanks for posting my quilt. My favorite part of any show is seeing friends. And it was so great to see you! We had such a great response to our little exhibit, I think we may do it again in the future. People love making reproduction quilts and making a smaller version seems more "doable"!

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  2. Wow, Ihope you have plans for all that fabric. It breeds in dark places so beware!

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  3. yay for hand quilting. I use a TJ Lang silver thimble and a very big hoop - good luck. I love hand quilting, I wish we could get together and quilt.
    Thanks for sharing some of the quilts. It looks like it was a fabulous show. I wish I could have made it there!

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  4. Hand quilting has certainly has been pushed to the far back corners. But it's so lovely when it's done. Have fun.

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  5. I'm with you on the hand quilting improvement bandwagon. I don't use a hoop and have been thinking that might be what I need to help improve my stitches. What a great batch of fabrics your friend shared! I love thrifting & estate sale-ing for shirts.

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  6. The felt hand on Wendy's quilt is so pretty--what a great idea! I'm all for hand quilting, too! Have fun and hope you get back into it :) Love all those thrift shop shirts. I can see them in a Log Cabin quilt.

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  7. Oh thimbles!! I hand stitch most of my work and struggle to find a good thimble. I usually end up without and suffering bruises, blood and blisters, rather like when I'm gardening as I hate the restriction of gardening gloves! But in spite of that hand quilting is so therapeutic, and your stitches don't have to be small, just regular(ish)!!

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  8. Hand quilting and log cabin blocks, both winners!

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