Greetings from Fort Worth, Texas
 

Ah, Fort Worth . . . where it's FINALLY sort-of fall! This Oregon girl wilts for about 8 months out of the year in sunny Texas. Fort Worth is a nice city, though, and I've made wonderful friends here.

Hello, everyone. I'm Mary. I've very recently taught myself to quilt. To do that, I've done an awful lot of online searches, and the Quilting Board keeps popping up with some really good information, so I thought, why not join? Finally, today, I did.

My first projects were four-patch (16 square) hot pads for a fall festival, which turned out pretty nice. My current project is quite different: a full-size bed EPP quilt in the “Star Bouquet” pattern, to replace the one I had on my bed as a child. I loved that quilt! It was a true 1940’s feedsack beauty that I even re-bound as a young teenager when the original binding began disintegrating. My great-grandmother made it for my father; she made quilts in different patterns for each of her grandchildren. My now ex-husband didn’t pay a storage bill while I was in graduate school, so someone somewhere (hopefully) is enjoying it. L Still, it’s been a wonderful adventure hunting for feedsack fabric and more contemporary material with a vintage look. I’ll include a block here and there made with new fabric scraps from a few of my sewing projects. I'm not going to rush it; it will be finished when it's finished. Here’s the very first block:

Anyway, I will finish this mini-novel and get on with the rest of the day. I look forward to meeting members and participating as much as two jobs allow. All the best, new friends!

Oh. I like what you are doing. Welcome to the board. You will find a lot of inspiration and help when needed here. I think you may have inspired me to start a new hand project

Welcome from southeastern PA. It's definitely Fall here - has been for a while. Lots of rain today. Since joining in July of 2014, I have to say my quilting has quite improved. I've gotten a lot of confidence and a little more creativity in my quilting. Lots of great advice and they are the most helpful group around, and the best part is there is absolutely NO bickering between members. I just love it here.

Hello Mary and welcome to the board! I like your block very much and I envision such a pretty quilt when you are done.

Welcome from Vermont! Very nice block.

Welcome from western NY and happy quilting :)
love your star

Welcome from Michigan!:)

:) welcome from se TX

Welcome from Southern California where it is still HOT! Your block is stunning. I hope you find the same great inspiration from this website as I do. Happy quilting.

Thank you, everyone, for the friendly welcomes.

I forgot to mention in my introduction that I found out the name of the quilt pattern through the Quilting Board. That is, if it's still a Star Bouquet when the stars are joined by a three-diamond large hexagon rather than a single diamond, as the Kansas City newspaper article showed. Not that it matters all that much.

Thank you all again for making me feel so welcome.

Hello, and welcome from Dallas Tx. area. I love this quilt block. Be sure and show us as it goes on.

Welcome from NE Ohio.

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*** HI! Y'all from the upstate of South Carolina.
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Angel Bear, a reunion would be nice, but quite unlikely. Meanwhile, replacing it 3 generations later somehow feels right and I'm content. Maybe you could say I lost a quilt and a husband, but only one of those needs replacing.

Thanks for the welcome, everyone. (By the way, is it always so difficult to type messages here? I've done messages from two different computers now, and I had the same problem with both; it's almost like there's no keystroke buffer)

Welcome from Fort Worth, I love your star! The Quilter's Stash in Hurst had a fabric line of reproduction feed sacks. I bought some years ago for my mom's Sun Bonnet Sue quilt, they still might have some. I've seen leftover fabrics from older design lines there. See you around, you'll love it here.

Thank you, Irene. I'll have to check out that shop. So far, I've been to Berry Patch and Cabbage Rose; Berry Patch had $1 fat quarters last time I was there! Quite a few of those will make it into my quilt. I'm not going to stress over the origin or age of the fabric, though there will be about 50% feedsack and vintage fabric, it looks like. Over the past year, my inner fabric-holic has emerged. If there's ever a meet-up or fabric swap here locally, I really look forward to that.

Welcome from Arizona. Your quilt will be beautiful.

I know the loss of quilts in storage units. My older son put a bunch of things in a storage unit and his exwife didn't keep up the payments......my granddaughter lost several quilts I had made for her. I was heart broken as the unit was auctioned off......I keep checking second hand stores to see if they turn up.

Hi Mary! Waving hello from Washington! :)