My Mother's Quilts

My mother, Ruth Brown, was born in April;

so she has been in my thoughts a lot lately.

She was a school teacher and taught in many country schoolhouses over the years finishing her career teaching Grade 3 (her favourite grade) at the Shubenacadie Elementary School.

We always did our lessons together on the kitchen table which we would pull over near the wood stove for comfort and warmth. When our lessons were finished, we often knitted or worked on quilt blocks. My mother's quilts were usually either hand pieced or embroidered. We often used scraps leftover from our clothing or we would order fabric from the Sears catalogue.

The quilt shown here was pieced by me and quilted by my mother. It was made from scraps from my dresses and also scraps from my mother's clothing as well as from her four sisters. It is one of my favourite quilts even today as I can look at it and remember the clothing that each of us wore at that time.

The nine patch block is a one of the easiest blocks to sew and that is why I chose it for my first quilt. The patches are fairly large and showcase the fabrics very well. I stitched the blocks by machine and I remember my mother thinking that was not the proper method but I was anxious to get my quilt finished and it seemed the best way to accomplish that quickly.

The quilt block shown here on the right is from a quilt that was made by my mother for my daughter, Candice.

We often ordered patterns that were advertised in the Free Press Weekly and sometimes we used drawings from colouring books to make children's quilts.

I only remember my mother having one quilt book and it was quite tattered from being used so often. I used to love looking through it and dreaming of all the quilts I would like to make.

It's really hard for me to imagine any quilters today that have only one quilt book!

This is my mother's quilt book; it was called Grandmother's Authentic Early American Patchwork Quilts.

The other packages are similar to the ones that we used to order from the newspaper. The ones shown here are some that I purchased at an antique sale.

Thanks for sharing my trip down memory lane. I would love to hear some of your quilting memories. Every quilt has a story to tell. "Those who sleep under a quilt sleep under a blanket of love."