The old, the improv and the new creation!

Sadly, at least 2 years or more ago my friends neighbor handed me a bag of quilt blocks.  The blocks were all hand embroidered by her grandma.  Well, if you know me, I don’t always hop right on a project.  I have to come up with an idea and plan. Last year I finished up 1/2 the blocks into the awesome quilt below.  This year, I finished #2!!

The blocks have an amazing story.  They were originally made by Hattie Eunice Halford Mitchell who was born in 1901 and passed away in 1969. Not sure much more information on her but I did google her and saw she was born and died in Mississippi.  She hand embroidered these bear blocks.  They are amazingly cute!! 

Going with the fashion of what was possibly her time, I pulled out the little bit of 30s fabric I had.  I already decide to do a kinda 1/2 log cabin block.  I squared each up.  Most between 7-8 inches to start. Then Building each embroidered block out to 12.5 inches. In no uniform fashion.  Just in a scrappy fashion.  As many would do back in her time period. Most with the same colors as embroidered in the blocks, but a few random color 30s fabrics thrown in.  I kept each bear in the top right corner. 

I then sewed them together to form a 3x4 layout.  Wanting to make it a little larger, I added a 2.5 inner red border and 4.5 outer.  The outer fabric is actually a vintage fabric that I also used in the blocks.  

After that, I cut up vintage pillow cases to form a backing. Then quilted it with straight lines in all the strips of the blocks.  The binding is made out of a blue fabric I picked to blend with the blue in the blocks. 

After 2 years of holding on to these blocks that are at least 52 years old, they finally are completed!! This goes along with this weeks theme.  Making something out of the old, letting my gut lead me to a finish.  Honestly, I have trouble following a pattern, as my gut loves to lead the way.  And it usually works out well!  

I love how this turned out.  Saving All the vintage and adding a bit of modern!!! Now to take a trip to Pawleys Island and delivering it to a granddaughter who is as old or older then her grandmother was when she made these blocks!