Originally Posted by MomtoBostonTerriers
Originally Posted by ArtisticDesign
A testiment to starch: My cousin got hired by a lady who had verrry old blocks that her grandmother had made and she wanted them made into a reversible wall hanging.. Just to explain how difficult this was...The grandmother was not the best quilter..One half squ triangle was almost twics as big as another within the block..The stitching was hand done and very shakey/uneven...Every block was exageratedly unsquare..
My cousin was brainstorming several ways on how to do this..She tried adding borders to the blocks ( so didnt work) She thought about fusing them onto muslin (which would have exagerated the wonky lil blocks and been permanent)...She tried squaring one up (looked really bad)..After a few more attempts she called me freaking out..
I went over and we brainstormed some more... I finally grabbed the heavy starch and starched both sides of the blocks/ironed, twice. As well as the border strips...Then we took the squ ruler and squared them up..They cut like butter, so easy..She took a deep breath and sewed one of the border strips on, also went so smooth she didn't even need pins...
The lady got tears in her eyes when she seen it..Not even caring that some of the (too big) half sq points were cut off lol.. If starch worked on these wonky blocks it'll make anything easier lol
Artistic Design,
Thank you so much for sharing this technique! I inherited many quilt blocks from my husband's grandmother. She pieced them by hand at the end of her life when her eyesight and hand coordination was not good. Those blocks have been sitting on my shelf for many years because I couldn't figure out what to do with them -- they are all different sizes and the hand stitching is wonky. Maybe I can actually use these blocks if I add in lots of starch and sashing between each block.
What a treasure to have! I would love to have something from one of our grandmother's! Best wishes doing something GREAT with it! :-)