A few years ago my MIL was going through some stuff stored in the bottom of a cedar chest and found a menagerie of hand-sewn quilt blocks that her mother made. They look like maybe they were her trial blocks or just left over ones. She was going to throw them out, but I asked for them. Now they are sitting in a tote in my sewing area and I can't decide what to do with them. Do ya'll have any suggestions? I've never hand quilted anything and know I do not have the appropriate time to do it properly.

I also have a complete queen size hand-sewn Maple Leaf quilt top my grandmother made for me, but was never able to finish.

I'm afraid to machine quilt them because I don't want to ruin them, but I'm just puzzled what to do. Can ya'll help me?

Hand quilting is not quick, but it can be very satisfying. Since there's no rush on getting them finished, why don't you give it a try? So what if it takes you several months or even a couple of years...

Can you post a pic of them??? How many are there?

Frame them. They would be beautiful on a wall.

What do you want to do with them :?: :?: Do you want to share them with relatives :?: I took part of a "Grandmothers Flower Garden" that my Grandma pieced, took individual blocks, mounted them on black paper and framed them. Then I gave my brothers, sisters, aunt and counsins all one block. Do you want to make something :?: :?: You could put them together to make a table runner, pillowshams, bedrunner, bedquilt, or a wall hanging. Personally I would lay them out and move them around till I found a pattern I liked and start sewing them together. The Quilt Police would not come knocking on your door and you would have something of your Grandma. It doesn't matter if you don't sew well by the time you're finished you will. :mrgreen:

I inherited a quilt top that my grandmother made in the late 1930's or early 1940's. I can't hand quilt - I don't have the talent and my hands hurt when I do anything that requires fine dexterity and lots of repetition. I found a local long arm quilter who rented me her machine, and I machine quilted it. That was three years ago, and it's holding up fine. (We do use it, but only when we have family visiting. The rest of the time I store it on a bed, with a store bought quilt over it to protect it from the sun.) So unless the quilt top is in bad shape, you can probably have it machine quilted.

The long arm quilter did caution me about quilting density - she said less is better on older fabric. She also told me to use a thin batting with the older fabric, so that's what I did.

By the way, I had no idea what I was doing when I used the long arm quilting machine. Ignorance is bliss... but I guarantee that it looks better badly quilted (by me) than it ever did sitting in a drawer.

How about framing some of the blocks and displaying them in the house? Or make some doll quilts. If you have little girls in your life, they will love them.