Works in Process--Books to Come

I have the corner appliqué to finish on these new 1857 Album blocks from Sentimental Stitches. I will do the embroidery on all of the blocks when the blocks are all finished. I am so enjoying these blocks.

Since making my William Shakespeare portrait I want to make more poet portrait quilts. Next up is Edgar Allan Poe. He was quite a craftsman as a writer. You can read how he wrote The Raven in his Philosophy of Composition here.

I want to drape a 'purple curtain' over the quilt because of the beautiful lines in the Raven: "And the silken, sad, uncertain rustling of each purple curtain/Thrilled me-- filled me, with fantastic terror never felt before."

Little Hazel by Esther Alui is sadly being neglected. I failed at machine piecing this block and started hand sewing it. I dislike hand sewing (although I like hand appliqué--go figure) and this is as far as I have gotten...a quarter of a block.

I finally started hand quilting my Austen Family Album by Barbara Brackman, finished a year ago. I expect it will take me a year of quilting to finish!

Quilt Books news:

I will be reviewing Suzie Parron's Following the Barn Quilt Trail from Ohio U Press! They are sending me the book. Perfect timing since last month Suzi was at my quilt guild and I took her workshop.

I have Bill Volckening's new book Modern Roots--Today's Quilts from Yesterday's Inspiration from C&T Publications to review. Bill has an amazing quilt collection. You can see his quilts shared on his blog Wonkyworld.

And the Schiffer Publication's books Inspired By The National Parks and Hmong Story Cloths are on my NetGally shelf.

Also, my review of Thomas Knauer's The Quilt Design Coloring Book will come out in August.

Fiction & Nonfiction

I was happy when St. Martin's Press reached out to offer me Lisa Scottoline's new book Damaged. Apparently they liked my review of Corrupted shared on Amazon. Having lived in Philly for 15 years my hubby and I appreciate Scottoline's books for the setting and enjoy her characters and stories.

I am currently reading Mad Enchantment about Monet and his water lily series and the novel Lucky Boy through NetGalley, and from Blogging for Books The Apache War.

Scheduled reviews to come include the Antarctic love story My Last Continent by Midge Raymond; David Abram's Iraqi war novel Fobbit; the Taming of the Shrew re-imagined in the Vinegar Girl by Anne Tyler; Larry Tye's new biography of Bobby Kennedy; an exploration of race in Absalom's Daughters by Suzanne Feldman;  Angels of Detroit by Christopher Hebert; Rae Meadow's Dust Bowl novel I Will Send Rain; the time spanning Mr. Eternity by Aaron Thier; first published in 1864 The Female Detective; The Last Days of Night by Graham Moore (soon to be a movie); The Illustrated Book of Sayings from around the world; and Tara Clancy's memoir The Clancys of Queens.

My NetGalley shelf also holds Victoria:The Queen by Julia Baird; Candace Millard's Hero of the Empire about Churchill during the Boer War; Alice Hoffman's Faithful; The Electrifying Fall of Rainbow City by Margaret Creighton about Buffalo, NY during the 1901 Pan American Exhibition; and The Language of Dying by Sarah Pinbourough called "A beautiful book, honestly told" by Neil Gaiman.

Whew! 

1990s Amish Made Quilts

Dianne recently came across a local estate sale that included a quilt collection. She was able to purchase a number at rock bottom prices. The quilts had labels with their provenance. They were predominately hand pieced and hand quilted.

This Mariner's Compass from Scottsdale, PA was labeled as Amish made in  1990. The label called this a "designer quilt," likely because it used one of the early designer border prints.

 The Medallion style quilt's many borders!

 Here you can see the hand stitching in the compass center.

  Another Mariner's quilt variation with a Broken Star setting.

 This Flying Geese in Cabin was marked "Amish." 

 An interesting Carolina Lily variation from Scottsdale PA.

The sashing is a designer border print.

Two floral appliqués. The first is Country Love by Rachel Pellman. Her Country Bride quilt sparked a whole series of new appliqué patterns that appealed to the Country decorators in the 1990s.

 I saw this quilt in these colors on Pinterest, pinned by Amish Country Lanes .

The second looks like another Rachel Pellman pattern but I have not been able to identify it yet.

The 1990s colors of mauve and dark green predominate in these quilts. I assume the colors were chosen to coordinate with the decorating colors of the era, the quilts meant for actual use. Lucky for Dianne, these were unused and unwashed, in original condition. Quilt marking lines could be seen.

An Amish made Whig Rose is dated 1989 from Evansville, IN.

An unusually large reverse appliqué Hmong quilt was stunning.

 It was found in St. Louis.