The Strawberry, Sunflower, Queen of the May, Chinese Star and/or Brimfield Awakening Quilt, Blog Post #3

If you’ve been following, you’ll know all about this disaster of a vintage quilt and how I’m rescuing it piece by piece. I’ve replaced all of the seriously damaged pieces in each of the 16 rings so it’s on to the damaged and/or missing white fabric throughout the quilt top.

This is what I’m faced with…over much of the quilt the white fabric is either very damaged or missing entirely, the same for much of the quilt batting.

After deciding not to try and replace the batting, I pull out a huge roll of soft white wide lace.

After positioning the lace over the damaged white fabric, using a very small tight zig-zag, I stitch at the outer edges of the pieced circle pieces.

The red line shows you where I stitched down the white lace, the blue line shows where the straight edges of two pieces of lace were slightly overlapped and were also zig-zag stitched.

After zig zag stitching, it was easy to trim away the lace that overlapped the block circle pieces.

I like the look of the lace but it leaves these white areas looking a little boring so…

I hunt up this yardage and pull out my Accuquilt cutter and heart shaped die.

I like that these hearts add interest but don’t steal the show.

Using a matte finish light pink thread, the hearts are machine applique stitched.

The white on white was at some times hard to follow and it helped to mark both the bottom point and top dip of each heart before stitching.

My marks were made with a Frixion pen, easily made invisible with a quilt touch of my iron.

Just to add a bit of interest, I chose a different heart fabric for the outer white areas of the quilt.

And then it was time to address the inner melon shaped pieces of the blocks. Just like I showed you in the previous blog post, I made a template for this melon piece. The eyelet fabric worked nicely.

Elmer’s Washable School Glue once again makes this quilt rescue easier. Once I’ve completely finished this rescue I will send the quilt through the washer and dryer and the glue will be history.

With the repairs completed, it’s time to add all the embellishments, bits and pieces of laces, trims, maybe some machine decorative stitching, ribbons, buttons and such.

I am loving the transformation of this old well loved, worn, torn and cut in two quilt! Remember how my project began? Here’s a pic:

Stay tuned for update #4!

Merry Christmas, Happy New Year and blessings, Rhonda

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Published by Rhonda Dort

A creative person living in Houston, TX

21 thoughts on “The Strawberry, Sunflower, Queen of the May, Chinese Star and/or Brimfield Awakening Quilt, Blog Post #3”

  2. Good afternoon! I really enjoy receiving your emails and seeing the wonderful things you do to save and repurpose vintage linens and quilts.

    I will lose access to this email address on February 1st. Would it be possible to change the email address from silvia@cssonsite.netsilvia@cssonsite.net to GmamaSilvia@outlook.comGmamaSilvia@outlook.com? Please let me know what I must do to effect this change. I would really appreciate that.

    Thank you for all you do and share, and thank you for your time and assistance.

    Silvia Middleton

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    1. Hi Silvia, thank you for your kind words! Changing your email is easy…for you. I can’t make the change but you can by going to my blog, looking down the left side to find: follow Blog via email. Just enter your new email. Easy!
      Blessings,
      Rhonda

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  8. I love your idea and all the pictures you post on how you are restoring this quilt. I have two old quilts. One that needs repair and one that is absolutely perfect. They are at least 60 years old….maybe older. I keep them in my safe closet. Your posts are so interesting and inspiring.

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  9. You have the patience of a saint! I love your creativity and thought you put into saving someone else’s handiwork. I look forward to your updates. God bless you for sharing.

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  10. Hi Rhonda. Love your quilt rescues! One question: how did you deal with the ragged white pieces that the lace covered – did you leave them alone or trim them out? Fill with pieces of batting? Ok that’s two question. Sorrry!
    Sally from Corner Threads

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  12. Wow!!
    I “rescued” a 100 year old quilt for a friend’s family. The back was White logo printed feedsacks of Raven milling company in Bowling Green Kentucky. It has holes all over it so I patched those but I did not want to cover the feedsacks printing as it was still clear. Have you never run into that? I fif use some of your techniques but I did use hand appliqué.

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  13. I am always amazed at the ideas you come up with. The lace and the embroidered fabric, how wonderful. Here I am with lots of both and never thought about using them for repairing a quilt!

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