Friday, March 02, 2012

Mrs. Kaneko's quilt is FINISHED!

Thanks to the snow I managed to finish Mrs. Kaneko's Bible quilt. I brought it home last Christmas and have been thinking about it and working on it ever since... Well, not diligently but here and then between other projects.

This is the original quilt. The sashing was a stained, warped, wrinkled beige. There was no quilting in any of the blocks.

At the beginning of January I cut the quilt apart and gave 4 of the blocks to Mrs. Furui to quilt for me while I quilted the other 5. As a lap quilting project this went very quickly!

The question was, how to put the 20 year old quilt back together without ruining the soft, fading colors. Of course I checked fabric stores but everything was too bold or too blah. BUT... a look in Mrs. Furui's stash and I found the PERFECT sashing for the new quilt! Same colors! Small design! The only problem was that there was only a small amount but Mrs. Furui and I both agreed that THIS was the fabric!

With a lot of measuring I managed to put all the blocks together with the new sashing and then fill the sashing strips with batting on the back and then fuse the batting in place. Last week, a few of us gathered for patchwork agreed that trying to introduce any more colors or patterns would kill the quilt so I made a thin white flange to go around the outside border. Hmm. You can't even see it in this picture... but it is there!

A whole piece new backing was added to the back and the blocks were requilted into place. The binding was rescued binding from the old quilt. I had carefully removed it (discovering that we had only been using single binding back then) and recycled it.

From the top left:

  • Star of Bethlehem-Matthew 2:1-10
  • The Dove (Holy Spirit)-Luke 3:16
  • Star and Cross (Purpose of His coming)-John 3:16
  • Hosanna-Matthew 21:1-11
  • Crown of Thorns-Mark 15:9-20
  • Cross and Crown-Mark 15:21-39
  • Butterfly (Resurrection)-Mark 16:1-11
  • Worlds Without End-Revelation 21:1-7
I think Mrs. Kaneko's new quilt has been brightened considerably with the new sashing but hasn't lost its original charm. And it finally hangs flat, with only a few wrinkles (a couple of the blocks are still too large but I couldn't fix that.)

I hope Mrs. Kaneko will enjoy her Bible quilt with a bit of new life breathed into it.

17 comments:

Nancy J said...

Tanya, you and Mrs Furui can be so very happy at the transformation of Mrs Kaneko's quilt . The new sashings, the extra borders all fit so well with the blocks.Lovely colour choices,and many hours, what a pleasure to see the old quilt remade, and Mrs Kaneko will now have many many years of joy with the old-to-new quilt. Fond greetings from Jean.

Cheryl's Teapots2Quilting said...

You did a great job. Looks like it was planned this way, not a 're-do'. Very nice.

puddle said...

Love is better the second time around?

Really lovely!

Anonymous said...

Ladies, how nicely this all worked out..the result very, very beautiful...and full of meaning...hugs, Pat in IN

AnnieO said...

What a rescue job! Congratulations on reworking this and giving the quilting a chance to shine too.

Mary said...

You did such a beautiful job of restoring Mrs.Kaneko's quilt! What a wonderful friend you are for doing this for her! I bet she'll be so very pleased!

Ruth said...

You did such a wonderful job to lovingly restore a quilt, I'm sure it will be treasured even more.

Allie said...

Wow - Tanya - even better this go around! The sashing really is the perfect fabric for this quilt. Wonderful!!!

Anonymous said...

You and Mrs. Furui did a wonderful job. Thanks for sharing.
cindy

Sue in LA said...

It really is beautiful. I, too, think that the sashing fabric is just right.

Jan said...

A lovely metamorphosis! You changed it for the better, you and Mrs. Furui.

Julie Fukuda said...

May Mrs. Kaneko"s quilt enjoy a new life in her new place. I had to go a long way back to look at the original post. Certainly you have made a big change to that quilt. From next week I will be teaching a bible quilt class from Sandy's patterns. The seeds she planted so long ago are still bearing fruit.

BrendaLou said...

what a labor of love and a joy this quilt has been in the past and will be in the future! Great job.

maddyrose said...

It is lovelier now than when it was first made because the sashing does more to add interest and unit the colors of the fabrics in the individual blocks. You've done a brilliant job of restoring this beautiful quilt.

Amanda said...

What a wonderful job you've done, and it looks like a new but familiar quilt.

Margaret Cooter said...

It looks gorgeous - what a great job you and your helpers did! a true labour of love...

Shasta said...

This is beautiful. The new sashing adds a lot.