Worn & Loved

I want it on my epitaph;  "I don't feel good!" (apologies to Luther Burbank).
Geez, even my Dr.'s office had no sympathy; with his nurse's stern phone lecture that I should push fluids and get bedrest. She also said that since it is viral, no antibiotics will touch it. Moan & groan.

In the absence of having anything that I've sewn to show you, I will remind you of the old adage, "Never say never!"
I swore to myself that I would never buy an antique quilt because I feared that if I bought one, then the floodgates would be open and that I would soon own a hundred of them.
My brother-in-law lives not far from the local "Antiques Alley" of Route 4 in Northwood, New Hampshire.

Before I caught this cold, I made the gross mistake of browsing in one of the shops there!

It was pure folly, of course, to tell myself that I was, "just looking." That's one of those lies that you tell yourself when you are very, very weak and vulnerable. Soon I was smitten by a circa 1880 log cabin, and then, just as quickly, I was about $300 lighter in my secret savings. This is what I bought:

The fabrics truly called to me. Many of Barbara Brackman's teachings on her Civil War Quilts blog have helped me to appreciate the riches within this anonymously pieced piece of American history.

There are about a dozen, "bad" or disintegrated brown madder fabrics.

But the blocks are beautiful! The shirtings are so varied. Click on any picture for a better look.

There is no discernible batting between the layers of this "summer quilt." The backing is a plain and now rather dirty muslin that was pieced.

It has a cinnamon double-pink narrow applied binding with slightly curved corners.

It was machine pieced and hand quilted. The hand quilting is visible from the back, but not on the front, and I cannot tell quite how that was accomplished.

The hand stitches are approximately 6 stitches per inch.

The whole quilt measures 86" square and the "logs" are about ¾" finished, with the center "chimney" being 1½" finished in the quilt.

Each of the 100 blocks is approximately 8" square. In the block pictured above, there is actually a printer's flaw that shows as a white streak in the red, black and grey print. She used it anyway! Over 100 years later, I still feel the same way about my scraps. They are all precious to me!

I hope that someday, 100 years or so from now, somebody will love what I did with my scraps, too. If not, I'll still have had my fun with them, LOL!

Lastly, thanks to the wonders of the internet, I'm glad to not be infecting you with this rotten cold, and I hope to feel up to sewing soon.

Stay calm and quilt on!