It is beautiful. I can just imagine my friends mother (who I knew as well)[ATTACH=CONFIG]599635[/ATTACH], aunts, grandmother, and great grandmother working on it. Thank you for your input.

that is such a beauty. with those green paths in the garden. Can't imagine leaving this unquilted for 70 years. She will be stunned when she sees it finished. I would use quilters dream, request, for batting and hand quilt it with a thin muslin backing to keep it sturdy and a tiny patterned, light calico for the backing. Best of luck.

Thanks everyone. I can just imagine all the dresses, aprons, and curtains that these scraps came from. I knew 2 of the ladies that worked on this, both passed on now. Handquilting it is.

Looks like it is on excellent condition. All those lovely hexies hand pieced by so many loving hands. I would check the backside to make sure all those seams are holding.......if good, don't bother with the muslin "lining" just use a good quality muslin for the backing, a thin cotton batt and either handquilt or machine quilt. What a beautiful top!

I just read an interesting article on quilt historian Barbara Brackman's blog, Material Culture, where she suggests that quilting very old tops is a bad idea.
http://barbarabrackman.blogspot.com/...a-5-quilt.html

be sure and press it first before layering with batt and back.

I believe the name of the pattern is 'Field of Diamonds', I have one similar and that is what the appraiser said it was.
A grand beauty you have to work on.

If that beautiful quilt is white background, I would find whitest cotton, and backing I could find. It'll show thru, so it needs white if it is white.

What a beauty! Last week I found a Grandmother's Flower Garden top at the goodwill for $6.00, it has a few issues but overall was well made and I think is a true scrap bag quilt with fabrics from maybe the 40s and definitely the 70s to maybe the very early 80s. The hexes are quite small, only 3/4" per side, however the top is HUGE basically king sized... I think it just got to be too big to handle for the original maker. I'm curious on how you are going to quilt yours I've been looking at traditional ways (around each row, around each hex, etc. mostly) and I don't think they are going to work for me using a quilting machine with such small hexes.

Well, I read everyones ideas and I agree with Jane Quilter. Use a thin white muslin and white cotton and beautiful light calico for the backing. That will make it gorgeous.