Okay, I have 3 quilts that were created in the 1930's and 1940's from North Carolina. They were created by my Great-Grandmother, Grandmother, and my mother. They are stuffed with cotton balls right off the cotton fields. All three are having a great quilting bee in heaven. However, they all told me to never, never wash the quilts because they will become flat. So they were always, beaten and laid on the grass in the sun to clean them. They still look like they were way back then. One was quilted by my Great-Grandmother with string that she got off the meat packages put in brown paper. My Grandmother, used yarn (that she made on this wooden contraption and cotton balls) to hand quilt after putting the cotton balls batting in the quilt made from feed sacks that she washed after my grandmother got them from him (if he didn't need them to use in the barn) to quilt. These quilts are treasured and will always be in my heart.