Piecing Scraps
Oh the beautiful alchemy of turning scraps into beautiful fabric! I've been digging through my boxes rooting out all the high-value bits I can find to piece this simple quilt top in spring bulb colors.
I've never sewn a quilt with purpose-bought fabric. Genetically, I can't. And while a quilt created from a line of gorgeous designer fabric may be elegant, it's going to lack the confident chic of a top put together from scraps. A top that says, "I do too match. Maybe you're the one who needs glasses!"
37 comments:
I have a lovely quilt, made with love out of old pajama pants, by a girl I used to babysit...she later lost her battle with Hodgkin's lymphoma, and I am so thankful for the beautiful piece of art she created for me.
Your quilt top looks amazing to me.
One day I want to make a spring-inspired quilt too. Hues of blue, green, yellow, pink, purple and maybe some purple seem just perfect to me. Perhaps some half square triangles made into a spring-like design. I can see it now.
I see a little of my purse and a little of my apron in that quilt! Super fun!!
It's beautiful!
Just beautiful! I am saving the dresses, skirts, etc. that my mom made for my girls for this very purpose. I need to learn how to make a quilt top first :)
I recognize a few of those scraps: lovely housecoats, Clara's dress.....
Beatufiul fabric!
I have limitted sewing abilty but LOVE textiles, I live in Hawaii and have fallen in love with thrifted quilts made with vintage hawaiian fabrics, they often also include japanese fabric, they are perfect expression of the cross culturalism here, there bright and absolutely georgous !
Quilts use to be all about re-using. They were never made from any new. I have beautiful quilts my Mom made - and they are filled with memories twice over - the first piece of clothing and now as a quilt.
This is lovely - quilts made from thrifted memories are SO much better than those pieced from shop bought fabrics.
You have inspired me to go and start working on that bag of blue and white scraps I have been collecting in the attic.
Blessings! Angela
I was refolding my larger scraps yesterday, and was just wondering how to use them up! Great idea! I need to make a template now. ;o)
I have spring fever more than I can stand! That is charming.
My favorite kind of quilt -- simple, purposeful, meaningful. I totally agree about fabric bought for the purpose of a quilt. I've done it lots of times, but it never has that true quilt feeling. Love the marriage of all those scraps into a warm, happy, satisfying blend of memory.
My absolute favorite kind of quilt Anna. I do admire those awe-inspiring ones that look as though someone did an oil painting, but those little squares out of scrap fabric - the best. They immediately put me in mind of "Little House on the Prairie".
It is beautiful and looks like spring. I think a quilt made out of scrap pieces is much better because it tells such a great story.
The first quilts I made for my daughters were scrap quilts and they are by far the most eye catching of all the quilts. Your quilt says spring.
The quilt top is lovely. I'm saving all my cotton scraps for this very purpose.
Cool story about your Frederick, too. Does he let you stroke his puffy cheeks?
Oh, it is just lovely AND refreshing to look at...
I love your quilt attitude. Quilts were traditionally created to use up every spare scrap of fabric. That they usually turned out so beautifully is a credit to the creator, moreso than when she goes out to buy coordinating fabric, I think.
Love the last line from the quilt. There's something beautiful about piecing from scraps. It's charm and warmth I think.
I love it! That looks like a quilt with a history, which I vastly prefer to having everything all perfectly coordinated.
I once had a quilt my grandmother made of bits and pieces from things she had sewn. Sadly, I did not realize what a treasure I had and did not care for it well.
Your quilt is lovely and all the pieces make a beautiful whole.
You have me inspired to start using my scraps!
Ae you literally just piecing them together or do you have a template/pattern that you are using?
It's beautiful! My favorite quilts are simple scrappy patchwork quilts...you've inspired me to dig out my scraps and get cutting. Thanks.
That's just the perfect description of how the ideal quilt would think/speak if it could. I'm like you - don't desire a all-new fabric quilt, and in my case can't afford one. As my love for quilts came from reading Little House books, it would just seem wrong to buy fabric for a quilt!
LOVE it!
Last summer I sewed a memory quilt for my bed made up of scraps of fabric I've been saving since I was first married. In the quilt are squares from my bridesmaids' dresses, maternity clothes and other dresses I've made for myself, baby quilts, little girl dresses and jammies, curtains, etc. I realized that I've sewn a lot these past seventeen years!
My memory quilt is one of my favorite things I've ever sewn. The fabrics might not match perfectly, but it tells the story of my married life in a beautiful way!
I'm sure you will enjoy your quilt and the memories it brings back to you as well!
This is very pretty. You're inspiring me to piece together a quilt using my existing fabric stash.
AMEN. I love being thrifty like that and using up all the scraps! I'm excitedly setting aside all my blue and grey scraps for my next quilt. Well, I still need to quilt my current patchwork one!
Please show us in progress pictures and tell how you do it. That would be so helpful to a novice like me.
i love that.
i'm all about telling the world
"i do too match, maybe you're the one that needs glasses"
thank you for the continued inspiration and sweetness... i check out every post you make.
=)
oh, and congrats on your parrot! that is crazy!
LOVE this quilt! Looks like something from the 50s! Both my grandmothers made quilts, one had stacks of tops made from flour sacks. I am mad now I didn't force them to teach me how!
It's interesting that you should have this post as I have been pouring over a book of patterns, contemplating my next creation. I admire your ability to create such a beautiful quilt out of scraps...I just can't do it. My orderly, symmetrical self just can't let go of what a quilt is "supposed" to look like. Maybe one day.
"Scrappy" quilts always look so much prettier to me than ones that are planned out. And yours is beautiful!
I have a doll-sized scrap quilt my (eternally recycling) grandmother made for me when I was tiny, and now it's my daugher's. Ironically, the name "Addie" is on one of the squares--it's the only text anywhere on the quilt, and it's my daughter's name! I loved it when I was little, and I love it still more now. Yours is lovely!
How beautiful. I've actually never quilted as an adult because I feel the same way: a quilt doesn't have life sewn into it with storebought fabric. Consequently, as I've only been married for three years and only have one baby so far, we haven't worn through enough fabric yet to make enough scraps! So, I wait patiently for the day when we start "wearing through the knees" so that I can make something lovely.
~Bethany
Oh...but as my wedding dress was irreprabably stained along the hem on my wedding day, I am debating cutting it up to make a baby quilt for my little ones (one coming in May!). But, I still can't bring myself to take a pair of scissors to my wedding dress!!
~Bethany
This is what quilting is about for me......
I too would appreciate a description of the steps taken to create your quilt.
I've been wanting to make a quilt in this pattern for a long time! I've got a stash of random scraps that I've been saving. I just don't really know how to sew~could be a problem, huh?
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