Quilting In The City

When I am in AZ. during the summer, brief visits usually, I try to get as many tops quilted as I can. Then when I return to the mountains I bind them & work on design & piecing more.
This time around in the city I quilted two of the vintage tops I got on eBay & a small UFO top that looks like rain forest to me. Three more quilts almost complete!


This first vintage bow tie quilt is very thin fabrics, mostly feed sack I suspect, so I decided to quilt it with an all-over meander, couldn't think of any other very simple design that would be age appropriate. I haven't all-over meandered a quilt since the very early days with my longarm, it's mindless quilting & allows for a lot of stabilizing of the hand-pieced seams. Oh yes, both of these are hand-pieced. There is a stain down the left side but the quilt hasn't yet been laundered & I'm thinking/hoping, a dose of Oxyclean will take out the stain.

The second is a different setting of a very scrappy bow tie, more colorful & sturdier, possibly a later vintage? I had a bit of an issue with the wavy borders, one in particular I decided I couldn't live with. I removed most of that side border & took out a couple of inches of excess fabric & re-attached the border. Both my Pfaffs are in CO. so I pulled out the trusty little pale green 40's Featherweight. I quilted this one with a freehand Baptist Fan design, goes fast & is very appropriate for the era I think. It's another design that helps to strengthen the hand sewn seams.

And here's a close up, you can see the freehand Baptist Fan design.
Both of these old quilts have a traditional [wide] bleached muslin for backing.

This is the little quilt that reminds me of a rain forest so I quilted the center with leaves & lizard type critters & the borders just with leaves.

I have at least another day with my LA so I'm trying to decide which quilt is next, I have plenty from which to choose!

Finally finished!

Unbelievable, but after almost a quarter century the Lover's Knot quilt is done, done, DONE can you hear me shouting from the rooftops, the dratted thing is almost vintage at it's completion.  

I tried to get a full photo on our bed but we have a footboard that get's in the way so I folded it back on itself.....
then hung it over the long arm rollers.

A close up of the corner & folded sawtooth border or Prairie Points as they are also called....

and even a label, now that's close to a miracle, LOL!
It goes to Australia with me in May for my SIL who has staked a claim to it, & my brother.

Below are photos of a vintage 30's top & some dresden blocks that a lady has asked me to work on. I'm looking for the right backing for the top, it is quite stained but I have information from my local quilt Historian & Appraiser Karen Housner so I can inform the quilt's owner & she can clean it.
You can see clearly in the close up below that the petals are gathered at the center, rather unusual in my experience & it has been suggested that it may be called a Missouri Daisy but if anyone has more accurate information on this block please let me know. It is very sweet, the 30's era quilts are winsome & charming. 

I Googled Missouri Daisy but did not come up with this particular pattern, perhaps there are variations of the block as often happens over the years.

Then there are 14 of these incomplete dresden plate blocks - I don't know that I will be taking on the job of completing these & constructing a quilt, it would be a big investment of time & I doubt my hands can tackle the hand work required I would have to do it by machine. Still thinking about it so I need to talk more with the owner.

Tomorrow I have a quilt to do on the LA, & Wednesday a little bit of an op. on my hand at Mayo Clinic, then hopefully back to the quilting Thursday as I don't think I will be too handicapped this time around.