Wednesday, April 1, 2015

The Blockade Quilt

I love walking into my little sewing room and seeing a quilt in progress on the hoop stand, so right after finishing the pin basting of Campfire Memories for machine quilting (see my last post) I layered this queen size gem. This is a vintage top acquired from an online seller a couple years back.  It came from the estate of an Ohio Mennonite woman who was a prolific quilter in her day.  The seller called the pattern "The Blockade."
Several of the blocks were lightly penciled with the intended quilting design, and the white border was completely marked for quilting.
Fabrics making up the blocks are primarily mid-century prints, mostly floral with a few polka dots, stripes and geometrics thrown in.  I'm reminded of some of my mom's dresses and dad's pajamas when I look at these prints.
Here is the first day's quilting effort:
And progress as of this morning, after a couple weeks' work the central area is nearly half quilted:
The backing is a soft bleached muslin, in keeping with the era of the top, though the batting is a more modern Hobbs Polydown.  Thread is Coats 100% cotton 20 wt. hand quilting thread (pink spool). This will make a great summer quilt, and with luck it may be finished to go on the guest bed sometime this summer.
Summer seems a long way off, as we are still having snow showers every couple days, and there are forecasts for accumulating snow for Easter weekend.  On the bright side, there is a one-day warm up predicted for Thursday!    Hope springs eternal!

10 comments:

Needled Mom said...

That is really beautiful and your quilting is making the design really pop. Are you following her pencil lines?

Quilting Babcia said...

Yes, I'm following her penciled outline for the blocks, although she had only penciled a few. I made a cereal box template and am marking the other blocks in blue washable marker.

Janet O. said...

Very nice quilting! That will be a lovely finish!

Kyle said...

What a delightful treasure. I'm glad you're following the quilt makers designs. She's probably very pleased. And it will look great for summertime use.

Doreen said...

So happy to see the progress on this one! Such an interesting choice/placement of fabrics and to have the markings mostly done...wow! Rich history there and lookin' real good!!!!

Kathy ... aka Nana said...

What a fabulous quilt ... and your quilting is perfect for it! I can't wait to see this one all finished.

Ruth said...

It's a lovely quilt and the quilting is lovely as well. Not to make you jealous or anything, but spring is in full bloom here and it is gorgeous. I've been working on planting some flowers and plan to have a small veggie garden too. Hang in there - it will happen! Spring, that is.

Teresa in Music City said...

What a bright and happy quilt! It will be beautiful when it is all quilted and that lovely design pops out on the borders :)

Ivory Spring said...

That is such a beautiful quilt!!!! Good job.

Dawn said...

Wow! What a great project. Seeing your lovely stitches motivates me to get my hoop out. Thank you for sharing.