Best. Present. Ever.

The other day when Mom came home she had THREE big boxes that she had picked up from the Post Office. She had helped pack them while she was still in CA- boxes of vintage fabric, that is. my aunt and grandma had gone through stuff and sent it to us.

I totally love vintage fabric and it's crazyness, so it was a great surprise!

 I love the teacups and teapots!

 This came with pieces cut out- appliques? I so wish there was more than a quarter yard, this was one of my faves.

 Love the Raggedy Ann and Andy too!

I don't know what I'll do with this stash yet, but the wheels are spinning!

I kept about half for myself, the rest Laura wanted or it was just too ugly! There is good crazy fabric...and bad crazy. Ha ha.

This is also a lesson NEVER to leave pins in your fabric/projects long term- it doesn't take much moisture to cause them to rust! There were a lot of pieces that had rusty pins in it, leaving rusty holes that will hopefully wash out or take some kind of treatment. Some pins were so rusted that they had bonded to the fabric- it took pliers to pull them out!

Vintage Christmas

I love vintage, and Christmas is no exception. One day I'd like to be all decked out like this:

{Image Rhonna Farrer}

...but I made some strides this year. I found some little bottlebrush trees at Walmart and at some drug stores that have a vintage vibe (and they were like a buck each!). They lived with Mom's things in the wardrobe:

I love love love little cardboard village houses, found a couple this year. They're only a couple bucks each as well, making for an affordable, cute display!

I love my Cracker Barrel Santa:

Dad has had this Santa for a long time, it's cute:

I found an antique place that sold vintage reflectors that go on big Christmas lights, you don't see these much:

I love vintage ornaments, and I loved the box too:

I used them and some vintage bells I found to make a garland over my closet door. The tinsel was from Walmart, I loved the shape!

I also found these sweet little molds, I'll turn them into ornaments one day. I think it'd be sweet to have a vintage kitchen themed tree when I get a kitchen of my own.

And there's new ornaments that look old, gotta love it!

I loved these quilts that I saw at Cracker Barrel, might have to copy them!

Aren't yo-yo's sweet?

When I was up in NY shooting the wedding I killed some time at this HUGE antique mall. Loved it! Couldn't buy everything, but it was fun to look:

Gotta love vintage Christmas linens!

You don't see many vintage tree stands, I liked this one but the $18 price tag was too much:

Aren't all these Santas cute?

And there were some great village houses, so tempting!

I think vintage Christmases are the best!

Antique Quilt Top

As I mentioned earlier, my mom and I purchased this antique quilt top from an antique store in Erie a couple of weeks ago. I just had to talk more about it. The pattern in called "Autumn Leaves" (I was so excited when I found it in a quilt book!) and it became popular in the '30s and '40s after it was shown at the Chicago World's Fair in 1933. This quilt top is from that time. It is a delight to behold in person- Mom and I just couldn't walk away. It's in really great condition. The workmanship is absolutely incredible- every stitch is hand sewn in perfect, tiny stitches. The mitered corners match up perfectly. Nearly every leaf is of a different fabric (only one or two are the same). I cannot imagine the hours spent on this.

Which brings up the question...who made this? We'll never know. The woman who had it in the store bought it a long time ago at an estate sale in the area and didn't know very much about it. One also has to ponder why it was never finished into a whole quilt. What we do know is this: whoever made this quilt top was very talented, both at sewing and at putting colors together. There is no area that looks "off" or out of place. The colors are well balanced. All the principles of design apply here.

Mom and I are doing our homework- how should we finish it? The quilt top is made for a Full bed, we will probably add a border or something to enlarge it a little to be Queen sized. There are several independent fabric stores around here that carry reproduction '30s fabric that we will have to go see. We need to find a backing fabric, fabric to bind the edges and perhaps fabric to make a border. We also need to figure out how to actually quilt it too- where should we put the stitches? Is there a design we should use? It'll be an adventure.

I know, I know- I really don't need any more projects...but I couldn't pass it up! It's funny that I like this quilt so much since I am really not a "yellow" person, but for some reason I love this quilt! It cheers me up.

Everytime I see it, it makes me happy!

Whoever you were who made this quilt top, thank you!