Friendship Quilt Pincushions

I thought I had already blogged about this estate sale find. All of $1 - that's right - one dollar!
The quilt was in pretty poor condition but it was a friendship quilt.
Back in the 1930's, 40's and even into the 50's, these quilts were very popular.

Each lady hand-embroidered their block with their signature done in their signature embroidery stitches. Embellished or not.

This particular quilt was done mostly by ladies from Oregon (swoon) in the 1930's using feedsack fabrics and tiny little hand stitches throughout. No machine piecing done.

If I hadn't of bought it, it would have gone to a landfill.

I sat on it for about a year before thinking of a way to upcycle it into something 'new'. 

All of the blocks were the same, hand-stitched six-sided stars with hexagons created  in-between. There is a fancy name for this block . . .maybe one of my readers knows it?

Seaside, Oregon. Complete with fishing boat and fish jumping. A crab! and a seashell.
Some ladies embroidered their town in addition to the date.
 This block was age-spotted but I couldn't leave it out of my pincushion collection.

 Cutting out 6 inch circles, preparatory to making the pincushions.

I gave the remaining holey quilt to a friend. There is still some usable parts of feedsack but I was done with it.

I made 20 pincushions.
Stuffed with lavender and polyester stuffing.
Finished off with floss and buttons from my grandmother's stash.
For sale in the etsy shop.

 More information on Friendship Quilts.

Bad Ass Pinking Shears

These are the far out pinking shears I found last Saturday at an estate sale.
My estate sale 'runner' usually hangs out in the Woodburn area so it was a surprise to see her in the Portland Gateway area.
Which, oddly enough, is near my favorite fabric store, Fabric Depot.

Her sale advertised the usual estate stuff plus YARN. Yes there was boat loads of yarn and just a wee bit of sewing notions.
These are still sharp and I love the blades. They give off that "we mean business" vibe.
$5.00.

 Also found, biggest covered buttons ever.
$2 ziploc -selling the rest of the notions.
I have a purpose for these if I can find the darn tutorial again.

And I just asked my creative friend if she had any jump rings on her.
hah - I find everything at garage sales.

Look at these cool tweezers. One can never have enough tweezers in life. . . or is that sewing machines. . . or is that scissors. . . patterns. . .fabric. . .