BUTTERFLY QUILT PATTERN 515 Laura Wheeler Designs

I am so excited with this find!  The pattern is quite brittle and I thought about pressing it flat but it is falling apart.  There are 73 finished butterfly blocks and enough pieces cut out but not put together for maybe another 30 blocks.  There are also a few finished half blocks and 1 finished quarter block.  This is a Laura Wheeler pattern probably one advertized in the newspaper or a magazine.  The box they were found in is an origional Laura Wheeler box that looks like a large shoe box that has a lable printed onto the end of the box with "HOME MADE" on the ends.  I do know where it came from and who put all these blocks together and about when.  The lady who made them was my husband's grandmother and I believe she made these between 1949-1950 as I know she became ill towards the end of 1950 and died before she could set the blocks together.  My father-in-law gave them to me.  He almost tossed them thinking they were no good anymore.
The butterflies are made of feed sack material.  Grandma would receive stacks of feed sacks from her sister who owned a Turkey Farm back then and she would save all the feed sacks and share them with her sisters. 

I need to soak these blocks and freshen them up.  Six have worn spots on the bottom edges of the blocks and I am trying to decide if I can use something to back them for strength.  I think I would love to finish this quilt.  I have only seen one other quilt this Grandma made, but am told that she made hundreds of quilts in her lifetime.  

Embroidered Flower Quilt

This is our flea market find last week.  It is 39" wide and 48" long.  As you can see, the blocks are quilted all over but the sashings are ditch quilted.  There is a pocket at the top back to hang it up.  It is signed on the back by the makers (2) and has a date 2001.  The quilting is done by machine. 

Sun Bonnet Sue

This is a pillowcase.  The skirt has three layers so the bottom ruffle really stands out.  I have been looking at various Sun Bonnet Girl patterns for a quilt for my granddaughter (s) and trying to find the right one that I would like to do.  Bought a couple books with all kinds of them thru and thru and they are all so different.  The pillowcase came from the thrift store for 25 cents!  I have seen other quilts and pillows with various versions, all slightly different.   This book is from the Oxmoor House Quilts Made Easy series.  It has about 8 or 9 patterns for Sun Bonnet Sue and Overall Sam.

Bow Tie Blocks

While working on my round of the Round Robin quilt, I wanted to try the Bow Tie pattern.  I hadn't done it before so worked on some sample blocks and then played with different ways of putting them together.  I found it fun to work with this pattern and I would love to make myself a quilt .  There seems to be as many ways to lay them out as there are pieces of material.  The first time I saw the pattern, it was on a quilt in a magazine and I kept going back to the magazine to look at the photo.  It just seemed to catch my attention and I am happy with the results.

More blocks set together

My daughter is always telling me to think out of the box.  Ok, these blocks are out of the box--of quilt blocks.  This top has thirty 10" blocks.  There are about that many more blocks not sewn together.  I am not sure what I am going to do with all of these but it is fun to look at them and think about it.  If I just put a border around this, it would make a twin size quilt.  Likely it will go back into the box until I discover it again some other time. 

Round Robin Quilt Tops

Have you ever worked on a Round Robin quilt?  This is a first for me.  The top picture was started by my daughter in January.  Now it is my turn to put a round on it.  What to do, what to do? I think this quilt top is pretty and full of action.  I hope I don't screw it up.  It is already 74" square. There are no rules to this Round Robin other than you can't discuss it with anyone else doing it until the day it is exchanged.  There are to be 7 rounds on each top.

The second photo is the one I have been working on.  I decided to do the bow tie pattern to frame in what was done before.  My daughter will work on this one now.  It is at 61".

String Quilt in Blues

My cousin found all the pieces for this quilt in a thrift store in Nevada and she and her mother put the quilt top together.  There were other quilt blocks in the box and I think she bought the whole thing to make several quilts.  This is full size.