These are indeed sad tales of quilts mis-used and abused. I have to say that I am guilty of damaging a quilt that was slaved over and gifted to me and my DH by my MIL (who is a wonderful, prolific quilter and the reason that I quilt today).
I picked the fabrics and she hand-pieced and hand-quilted a gorgeous KING SIZED floral applique quilt. It is stunning and the moment I saw it I fell in love.
Well one day I noticed an older blood stain on the quilt and panicked. I know blood stains can be handled when fresh but old dried ones can be tricky so I turned to the internet for help (first mistake). I came back with recommendations to use Hydrogen Peroxide to soak the stain and then wash it with cold water. I soaked and when I checked it, to my horror, I could see color running out of the fabric (dark green, gold, burgundy and white) and the stuff had actually eaten a hole in the fabric.
Anyone want to guess how hard I cried when I saw what I had done? Then I had to call my MIL and explain and ask if she could help. She came and patched it for me, told me not to worry and said she would just make me another one, or now that I was a quilter, I could make one for myself.
To this day, every time I think about it I get a horrible sick feeling in my stomach. I think I apologized for about a year for that one and will NEVER make that mistake again!
Luckily, the damage was on a border section so we did continue to use and enjoy the quilt. I recently put it away however, because the fabric was getting brittle and I wanted to prevent further damage from my rambunctious kids bouncing on my bed. Will get it out again when there are not boys running on the top of my bed and it will be admired once again.
This was a tough one. I knew with painstaking detail how much love, time and energy went into that quilt. And then I came along like the biggest Dips*@t in the world and ruined it!!!
