Westering Women Top ~ A Finish

Hi! What are your feelings about deadlines? I like them, I do well with plans and deadlines and enjoy the self imposed pressure to get things done. I finished Westering Women [top only] this past Wednesday, January 31 , just in time for Barbara Brackman, quilt historian and author, to begin her 2018 block of the month sew along.

 Westering Women was her 2016 project, a free block each month; I skipped 2017. My winter plan was to get WW done by February first and I am so happy to be finished!

I enjoy Brackman's sewalongs because they are pressure free. There is no competition, no one who gets it done quicker and better, no progress reports, no show and tell. She puts the blocks out there, the rest is up to you [me]. I also very much enjoy learning each month. I am interested in social history, the lives and interests of regular people in the past. I think school "History 101" does itself a disservice by focusing only on politics, kings/ queens/ presidents' shenanigans, wars and battles. Treaties! The lives of real folks are mostly ignored, which is too bad. Because back then, as now, we all know that what goes on in DC has very little to do with our daily lives, right?
And of course social history is the story of women, their lives and contributions. And for us quilt lovers, we find their stories in the quilts.

Westering Women is the story of pioneers travelling west. My own story was a young woman, Annabelle "Annie" Smith, newly wed, adventurous and strong. I added a few blocks representing more of her life.

Prairie Queen: "You must be tough to survive on the plains."

Log Cabin: The home she and her husband, Will Smith, built:

Basket: Their first harvest, when they knew they would survive and prosper.

The blue sashing is from a line called Baltimore Blues, by Barbara Brackman, a nod to her fabric design work. The gorgeous blue stripe [in my make believe story] was from a bolt of Prussian Blue fabric sent to my young woman by her dear sister who stayed in the East, married a prominent Baltimore ship builder. Annie made herself a Sunday best dress with the stripe and  and pinafores for Emmeline and Eustacia Rae; she used the leftover bits in this quilt.

I added random red, ''scrap bag'' cornerstones and in the borders a stack of red squares that symbolize the mileage cairns left along the westward trail.

(Sadly these rock piles, or cairns, were often left for a loved one who died on the journey, but I do not put death images on my quilts, so I choose to  call them milestones.)

I chose this Covered Wagon, "Prairie Schooner"  print for the backing.

Like some of my other snuck in bits of fabric:

this is not at all correct for the period of the story or the quilt. But nevermind, who could resist wagon trail wagons! They are quite large 2"?, too big to pass of as amid-1800s conversational print. The print is from the Little House on the Prairie line, artist Garth Williams endpaper illustrations, from the books I so loved as a child.

The quilting will be Fans probably. The binding red, or if I relax my death image rule, perhaps black, as Annie, now old and frail, finishes her  journal/ journey  quilt and adds the final black edge for her beloved husband Will who returned east and fought and died for the Union in the  terrible battle at Gettysburg, in 1863.

A side note---oddly this square, Gum Leaf, is the most pinned block from my project and blog.

But Corn and Beans is still my own favorite.

Final thoughts: I would like to design/make an applique quilt that is Prairie Weeds and Wildflowers of the Trail  West. And I'd love it if Brackman branched out and did the history and blocks of the 20th century. Maybe WW2?
Brackman's new projects is Antebellum Schoolgirl Letters and Diaries. HERE   and here  I'll be back next week to show you the choices for design and colorways for that quilt.

Mo supervised of course!

But it has gotten cold, very cold again. Mo retreated to the bed with his new favorite chenille and faux fur throw.

Zzzzz. Pugs snore. A lot.

Menu tonight- leftover roast beef turned into Stroganoff, steamed green veggies. And I may bake a pound cake to heat up the oven, freeze for my friend's visit in a few weeks. If it stays so cold we'll need a hot cup of tea and a bit of cake after thrifting all day.

Have a great weekend.

love

lizzy

gone to the beach...

link to more of Annie's story. Scroll down. here

Collecting

Hi everyone! I've been working on the final touches of the winter decor here at the beach. Mel, you'll be happy to hear I put the black flannel/ wool applique Pokeberry quilt on my bed! [Color me not thrilled with the way the black flannel looks in the relentless winter sun.] I did home tasks, like wash the windows, wash the curtains and throw rugs, ran the oven cleaning cycle on a day when I could open a door to vent the icky fumes. [lasagna , it always spills, doesn't it?] And I finally switched out the red/ pink Staffordshire china for the black version.

I collect many things. With the destash, declutter movements of our current world, is collecting out of favor? Probably that  won't faze me---if you look at my Pinterest profile you will see board after board, all filled with things I love and collect. Quilts, Swedish horses, furniture painted blue; white dowry textiles, 19th century christening gowns, thimbles, decoys, crocks, ships in bottles, Shaker pantry boxes, wooden spools, baskets, souvenir buildings, shells and sea glass, on and on. Obviously everything cannot be out at once, the clutter would be horrifying. Therefore I rotate. I have a lot of English Staffordshire transferware  [think Blue Willow or Pink Italian Castles] in many colors. It ranges in age from early 1800s to just-made-yesterday.

I remember buying my first bits of blue and white china, many years ago. We had just gotten married and bought our loft in Brooklyn. We took all my then-husband's art deco lamps, Japanese prints, juke boxes and my Fiestaware to the loft; we wanted an eclectic urban look, with black furniture and beautifully redone rock maple floors, oriental rugs. The beach house then had to be redone, in, I decided, all white with blue accents. Only blue because we only lived there [here] on summer weekends back then.
At that time I collected just the Fiestaware , silver snuff boxes, and delicate gold Victorian rings.The silver and jewelry were stolen from my old Brooklyn apartment so I just had the Fiestaware, the cottage rooms were bare. We found  beachy furniture in Pennsylvania and at a shop in Manhattan that had Nordic and Irish country  pine. The plate rack came home from a flea market  one October;

---the next day I went to a shop on Court Street and told the dealer/ friend I needed blue and white china to fill the new wall cupboard. He obliged with a stack of what is some of my best blue transferware. Then over the years I added pink [called red]; sepia, my fave; purple, brown, and a few polychrome or multicolored bits. I am especially fond of my small collection of black and white transferware. I enjoy getting it out, washing it gently and carefully arranging the plates on my shelf.

I mix it with blue and also with white ironstone sometimes.

I don't mind if the china is chipped or crackled or stained. In fact I prefer that.

And I especially love the reverse sides of the china. The stamps and decorations are so interesting and beautiful. [actual plates are after the back stamp pics] ~

Back of a very old Wedgwood? small plate. C. 1830-60? [The plate is stamped Wedgwood but this ink logo obviously is some other company. Perhaps Wedgwood made the blank china piece and this WS & Co is the pattern decorator and seller?  :

This is a much-copied pattern, Asiatic Pheasant . I have pieces of it in blue from T J Maxx, but this is the real thing, about 1850; a weird paste china not the usual ironstorne of most transferware.

Very old, "flow" black. The ink was made deliberately so it ran or flowed. This is beautifully decorated on the reverse.

Often too the edges or borders are interesting and beautiful,

Like a wonderful calico or chintz of the same era.

They speak to me of a long ago time.

Even if they were made just yesterday.

What do you think, collect or declutter? Which is more fun, which is ''you''?

love

 lizzy

gone to the beach...

We had a little snow this AM.

Paperwhite daffs update, yesterday, exactly two weeks from starting, first flowers have bloomed.

So cute and tiny!

Behind it is the jelly ''safe'' I often mention, a family piece, faded red paint over mystery wood. Dovetails and old white china knobs. Made by a German ancestor in Pennsylvania,  to store jams and jelly and potted fruit. C. 1840-50.

What IS transferware? here

Lovely online shop for transferware HERE