Responsible Quilting - Where Did the Acorns Come From?

Sometimes all the forces in the universe...and your friends...conspire against you and you find yourself in the middle of a project that was not on your list of things to do now. This is what happened to me:

1. Suzanne Marshall was our speaker at the October guild meeting. She turned me onto the idea of seeking inspiration from antique quilts.
2. At the guild meeting Ada gave Sherrie and I each a book to look at. I had America's Quilts and Coverlets by Carleton L Safford and Robert Bishop. It had older quilts in it, quilts with beautiful applique designs and exquisite quilting. I saw many quilts I admired, including a quilt with the Bethlehem Star block. It is a block I had admired for a long time. I always thought it would be good for the center of a medallion quilt, but I'd never gotten around to implementing that thought.
3. Sherrie has been talking about making a medallion quilt. That put medallion quilts in my head on a regular basis.
4. I made a spur of the moment trip to Peace and Applique on the Saturday after the guild meeting because I hadn't been there for a long time, and it was a nice day for a drive. I purchased a nice background print with brown in it and a luscious dark brown and black paisley. I had no intention of using them together. By the time I got home, I had decided to use them with some third medium fabric from my stash to make the Bethlehem Star block. The new fabrics were washed and pressed and never even made it into the closet. They were immediately promoted to in use. The block was finished several days later. I was really pleased with it and thought it had good contrast.
5. Ada, Sherrie and I met to talk about contrast. Sherrie and I traded books. I got Collaborative Quilting by Freddy Moran and Gwen Marston. I've always thought of them as modern quilters and must confess their quilts did not speak to me. Yet I was somewhat interested in Freddy because I met her while taking the Sue Nickels applique class at MAQS. She'd flown in from California because an exhibit of her quilts was opening that week. In reading the book, I discovered that Gwen (from Beaver Island, Michigan) learned quilting from very traditional quilters. Her quilts are actually modern interpretations of old quilts. In her tips for studying antique quilts, she suggests looking for surprises hidden in the quilts.
6. At our contrast meeting we had also discussed that it is more difficult to make a quilt with fewer fabrics because each fabric has a greater responsibility for the success of the quilt. I decided to make the Bethlehem Star block the center of a medallion quilt that had only those 3 fabrics. That meant each fabric had 33.33333% of the responsibility for the quilt. (I was relieved that I was in no way responsible.)

I did not plan the entire medallion quilt at once. Each border was designed when I got to it based on what I thought was needed next. I had to made a second trip to Peace and Applique for more of the dark and light fabrics. I was not able to locate more of the medium so it was in somewhat limited supply. Here is the evolution of the quilt:

• The center block is 16" finished.
• The first border is a 2" finished light strip. It sets off the Bethlehem Star block and makes the top 20" finished.
• The second border has 2" by 4" finished flying geese. I needed 40 flying geese and something for the corners. At first I was going to make all the flying geese dark. Then I decided a surprise was in order. I used 23 dark and 17 medium flying geese arranged almost, but not quite, uniformly. The corners have dark square in a square blocks. The piece then measured 28" finished.
• The third border is another 2" finished light strip. I wanted the square to measure 32" and thought the strip would add a little area for some nice quilting anyway. It was justified.
• I wanted the square to measure 32" because I decided the fourth border would be 8" finished sawtooth star blocks - 16 in all separated by 2" finished strips to make piecing easier. While working on the 8" blocks, I was reminded that it can be a bit boring to make many blocks using the same fabric. I hadn't done that since my first year of quilting. Finally I asked myself if I could do something other than make 16 identical blocks out of the same fabric. I made two stars of the medium fabric and that gave me a slight feeling of change. Next I began contemplating an appliqued strip for the bottom of the fourth border - a squirrel in silhouette, oak leaves, and acorns. I decided to call the quilt Where Did the Acorns Come From as a reminder of the silly squirrels who drag acorns to my yard from somewhere and plant them in my mulched beds where they germinate as oak trees. This little quilt was taking on a life of its own. It had grown too large for my small design wall. I was wishing I had a larger one. Must remedy that sometime.
• I was so pleased with the leaves in the bottom of the fourth border that I decided more appliqued leaves were in order. The fifth border would have angled oak leaves on 6" side borders and a 6" zig zag at the top and bottom. I added the zig zag to make the quilt rectangular instead of square.
• The sixth and final border is only on two sides - the top and the bottom. This border has angled oak leaves similar to the oak leaf borders in the previous step. The finished size of the quilt will be about 60x72.

I will still need to quilt this top, but I'll let that be a different entry in the journal.

I thought it strange that, in the midst of reading Collaborative Quilting and studying all the riotously wild quilts, I was making a quilt of 3 fabrics in browns, a color which Freddy "does not understand." Perhaps it was the equivalent of Gwen having to lie down for awhile after working on a really wild top.

During the fourth border I started feeling like I was taking some risks, which Gwen recommends. The fourth border was spanning days even though it was not all that complicated. I thought about it and looked at it a lot. I wondered how the same design would look made of many fabrics. Will I have to make two?

I am excited about this quilt. Even though I've made many quilts without following a pattern, this is the first time since I started quilting in 1998 that I feel my work is truly original.