Re-Making an Old Quilt

Stacey brought this quilt to me and asked if I could repair and restore it.  It belonged to her cousin, who recently died.  And it was made by her aunt.  It's a family treasure!  

 

It looked like a challenge, but I accepted.  The quilt has been hand embroidered on printed muslin squares.  Then it was hand quilted.

Here are some close-ups of the damage on the front of the quilt.

 

 

 

And here are some pictures of the back of the quilt.
 

All of the hand quilting thread has rotted, and it all had to be removed.  I sat on the floor and used my tweezers.  It took a few sittings to get it all done.  I listened to music or church talk CDs.  It was actually quite relaxing.

After the quilt was dissected, I sewed a stay-stitch around every piece.

Now, they're ready to be washed.  I used a large, flat plastic container (tub).  

And two different soaps.  

  

I used the spot remover on any spot I could find.  

Then I added the recommended amount of soap to the tub, and placed the blocks into the tub.  I let them sit for a while, then agitated them gently.  Then I rinsed the blocks and re-filled the tub with soap and water and repeated.

You can see how dirty the blocks were.  And the big, yellow spot didn't come out.

 I laid the blocks on a couple thick towels to dry.

 

The purple fabric is a poly/cotton blend, and it held up better than the cotton muslin.  So I washed all of the purple fabrics in the washing machine on a delicate cycle.  I also put the smaller strips into a laundry bag so they wouldn't get all twisted up.  I treated spots and use the quilt soap in the washer.  I dried them in the dryer on a low temperature.

 

When the blocks were dry, I pressed them with diluted Best Press.  Then I fused Pelon's Shape Flex Lite to the back of each block.   Now they are ready to be repaired.

 

 First, I mended any tears or areas where the fabric was worn out.  I used the darning stitch on my Bernina, with some matching Aurifil thread.  I know I took pictures of the mended areas, but I can't see them in the pictures.

 

Then there were quite a few spots in the hand embroidery that needed to be re-embroidered.  The blocks have 3  different shades of purple thread.  It was very hard to match the old thread with new thread colors.  So the match isn't perfect, but I did the best I could.

 

Now it's time to trim the blocks to a uniform size.  They were originally 16 1/2" (16" finished).  But the fabric was so rotted at the seam, that I had to remove all of the seam allowances.  So, the biggest I can cut them is 15 3/4".

  So, I made a tissue paper template.  I lined up the center square, then turned the template so the corners were as even as possible.  I marked the edges of two sides, then cut those two sides off.  I used my 15" square ruler for most of the trimming, and to make sure the blocks were square.  I have to slide my 15" ruler to cut all the way across, but it works fine.

After the first two sides are trimmed, I used a 6 1/2" X 12" ruler to add 3/4" onto my 15" ruler.  Then trim the other two sides.

There were three blocks that I couldn't salvage, so we decided to make the quilt with just nine of the blocks.  There was enough of the purple fabric to put the top together without using any stained parts. 

 

Here's the completed top.   

The original quilt was pieced in rows, instead of adding side borders. So that's the way I put it back together.

I gave the quilt to someone who is currently hand quilt it.  I can't wait to see it finished!