Quilter's Newsletter

 

Love, Joy, Piece

Quilter's Newsletter
September 2004, Vol. 3

Editor: Marlys Wiens

From the Editor

September is here and the feeling and smells of autumn are in the air in Minnesota! It makes a person want to pull out your favorite flannel quilt and curl up with a book.

A question facing MCC Relief Auctions is: should used quilts be auctioned? Whatever word you want to use, "Antique" or "Used", there is a definite market or interest in "Antique" quilts. For the donor or Quilt Committee, "Antiques" are wonderful finds and there is minimal preparation for the quilts for Auction.

Part of the opportunity of including "Antique" quilts is education and marketing the quilts. I have spent some time gathering information and am slightly overwhelmed with the number of wonderful quilt books published and available at your local quilt shop. You may also find some at your used book store.

One of my favorite quilt books on the history and picturing of Mennonite Quilts is Mennonite Quilts and Pieces by Judy Schroeder Tomlonson published by Good Books with a Copyright of 1985. The book might be hard to find since most quilts shops no longer have the book. Several of the quilts featured in the book are in my family. Yes, "Quilt of a Thousand Prints/Rainbow Around the World" is one of them and the owner, my aunt, wants to donate it to Goodwill because the purple ran into the lighter colors. The challenge/struggle is how do we keep our quilts that have our history.

Recently I had a chat with Patricia Cox, the author of American Quilt Classics from the Collection of Patricia Cox published by That Patchwork Place. Pat also is an International appliqué teacher and appraises quilts. She pointed out a whole shelf of quilt books from various states giving quilt history. A quick list includes:

• Kansas Quilts and Quilters by numerous authors.
• Quilters in Community Ohio's Tradition by numerous authors.
• Virginia Quilts Museum by Joan Knight
• Ontario Heritage Quilts by Marilyn Walker

Apparently Pennsylvania and Ohio, among other states, have one or more quilt books for each county in the state. What a wealth of information already completed for us!

If you would like to order one of these books, they are available from Glad Creations: www.gladcreationsquilts.com.

 

Thank you,

Marlys Wiens

 

 

Quilt Tips:

 

• Are you challenged with getting the corners of your quilts square or the same measurement at the top, middle, and bottom? Try using the 12 inch or 15 inch square ruler to square up your quilts. Joanne Fabric's often has 40% or 50% off coupons and square rulers are wonderful for these purchases.
• Idea — Have an extra quilt or need a quilt for your auction? Rocky Mountain MCC Sale is requesting quilts.
• Bindings —To get nice and square finished bindings, are you stopping exactly ¼ inch from the end of your quilt and folding the binding as you start down the next side? It’s all underneath but I find that exactness in measurement is the key!
• Washing/drying fabric — If the fabric is not 100% dry, let hang or lay flat on a bed, eliminating hours of ironing.

 

 

 

Quilt to make reappearance at the Oregon Sale

A quilt top pieced by the late Kathleen Kenagy of Lebanon Mennonite Church is making a second appearance at the October 9, 2004, Mennonite Festival for World Relief in Albany, Oregon - this time as the festival's feature quilt.

Kenagy was well known throughout the region for her fine quilting as well as her fearless and brilliant use of color. After she died in February 2003, a number of her last pieced quilt tops were knotted and sold at the 2003 festival.

As Lisa Ebersole of Corvallis Mennonite Fellowship watched one such comforter go to the auction block, she had an idea: wouldn't it be neat to buy this queen-size top and quilt it? She hurriedly began pulling together commitments of cash from other church members and eventually gave the winning bid of $800. A group of women from the church spent the next several months doing the quilting and now the spread has been redonated to the festival.

"It was just amazing how Kathleen combined fabrics," Ebersole says. "This top was beautiful as a knotted comforter but I think it's even more special now that it's been quilted."

"Kathleen used a lot of bright colors and combinations that were unexpected but worked real well," adds Jackie Swartzendruber, who finished up much of the quilting. "The more I worked with it, the more it grew on me. Kathleen was a real artist."

 

By: Cathleen Hockman-Wert
Publicity Director
Oregon Mennonite Festival for World Relief
420 SE Richland Ave.
Corvallis, OR 97333
(541) 752-0444

www.oregonmennofest.org

 

We would like to hear your stories! Share your pictures, favorite shops, and patterns. We are about sharing and we need to hear from YOU!

 

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January 2005 Edition — Look for the article on Machine Quilting, Machine and Hand Quilting from Ontario.

Email Chat room — To sign up for the email chat room, please send your email address to Harriet Berg at .

Newsletter — To sign up to receive Love, Joy, Piece Newsletter by mail, please send your requests to:

US

Marlys Wiens

7310 York Avenue S. #105
Edina, MN 55435.

CANADA

Bev Patkau

227 Valhalla Crescent NW
Calgary AB Canada T3A 1Z8

Share YOUR ideas, YOUR tips, and YOUR stories. We look forward to hearing from YOU!