Thursday, October 9, 2008

Sarah's Medallion ......!

At last, I have something quilty to write about. Today, I had a class with Froncie Quinn from Hoopla Patterns and what a great class it was!

Last night, she was the guest speaking at our guild. She is presently doing some extensive research on Florence Peto (1884-1970), a prolific quilter and quilt historian who has inducted in the Quilter’s Hall of Fame. What a fascinating lecture!

This is Froncie holding her version of the center medallion from the Sarah Johnson Quilt.

This quilt is dated 1826. Would you believe that Sarah was 14 years old when she made this quilt? Oh, and it was her fourth (4th) quilt!

In today's class, we learned how to hand piece our blocks the old fashion way with templates, pencil, scissors and a threaded needle. The beauty of this method is that it doesn't matter if you cannot cut straight, you're following a straight line in the back of your fabric!

This is my first ever hand pieced block!

I used some of the Smithsonian reproduction fabrics I had purchased many many years ago.

The block measures four (4) inches finished so you can imagine how small the pieces are! What a great way to use up scraps! lol

Here's Jennifer hard at work on her block.

It takes some time to get the hang of holding such small pieces and coordinating the needle to sew on the line.

I'm sure that with practice, I'll be quick about it.

These are the class blocks! Aren't they pretty?

It's wonderful to see the diversity in fabric choice!

Last but not least, my purchases!

Her patterns are wonderful. They include eveything you need to reproduce the quilt, minus the fabric! lol Some even have the stencils, as in the case of the Sarah Johnson Quilt, for the hand quilting design!

I certainly highly recommend Froncie Quinn as a lecture and teacher. She's fun to learn with and makes it look so easy!

So that's my day and what a great day it was! I can certainly see more hand piecing in the near future.

Thank you for stopping by! Cheers!

15 comments:

Vicki W said...

I'm glad you finally got a quilting day! It looks like it was a fantastic class.

Pam said...

I love the Sarah Johnson quilt - I am going to have to search that out and find out more - I have never heard of it before. And it is just like the Dear Jane - which I have been doing the hand pieced method, much easier to sew those tiny little pieces together by hand that's for sure. I have LOTS of extra fabric!! Great new project - because I NEED a new project -LOL

Gina said...

Sounds like you had a great day. I love hand piecing blocks. That's how I did my first quilt. Even now I'll still hand piece sometimes. I find it more relaxing than machine piecing.

Love and hugs Gina xxx

Julia said...

What a fun day! The best kind of day, quilting with friends!
I have always wanted to try some hand-piecing. I have a dream of doing a quilt completely by hand, piecing-quilting, everything. A good thing to know if your power goes out! :~)

Anonymous said...

Finally a quilt day for you! When I first learned to quilt it was all hand pieced. Rotary cutting wasn't as it is today. When I look back on some of the books I purchased in the 80's they are templates! :-) Too Funny.

Unknown said...

Nest thing you know is that you will be handstitching Dear Jane :)

Quilter Going Bananas said...

It's nice to know how to hand piece as it's a portable project then. My first quilt class I took was on hand piecing and hand quilting and I made a 20 block sampler by hand. I still love it and I made it in 1995!

Libby said...

What a fun lecture and class! I have on my 'Bucket List' to hand piece a quilt in this way and to get my treadle sewing machine in working order to piece a quilt on it.

Carin said...

We just learned to hand piece in my guild last month, it was really fun and relaxing. My biggest problem was my artifical nails kept getting in the way.

Needled Mom said...

I started quilting with hand piecing and have always loved it. It is such a great grab and go project when one does it by hand. I know that you will be speedy at it before you know it.

4th quilt????? I'm blown away by that idea.

Anonymous said...

that jennifer friend looks like one kool kat!

Wendy said...

I've never tried hand piecing, yours turned out wonderful. I think it's the time factor, piecing is so much faster by machine. I would like to try a LeMoyne star one day.

Darlene said...

What a fun class! It would be so much fun to handpiece and handquilt one quilt. Sigh!

Ginger Patches said...

I'm going to show this to my 14 year old Sarah! See if I can motivate her lol! I once listened to a podcast with Jinny Beyer and she said she can hand piece faster than most people can machine piece, wow can you imagine? Thanks for sharing such an interesting class :)

Mrs. Goodneedle said...

I don't think there's anything more calming or centering than handwork. This statement from the machine queen, I know, it doesn't make sense for me to say that! The blocks are great, Carole! Enjoy the process...

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