Wednesday, May 03, 2006

Hexies From the Past



So many beautiful hexagon patterns have been posted on various blogs lately that I decided to post a couple of photos of two quilts from my collection. The bottom one dates to the late 19th century and is a mosaic style. I purchased it from an antique dealer many years ago and never tire of it. The fabrics are so great and I love how the maker made almost a concentric ring of hexagons. It currently hangs folded on a rod in my living room.

The top one is one of my all-time favorite quilts. It, too, came from an antique dealer several years ago. It is one of the cheeriest quilts I own. It is a Grandmother's Flower Garden. I often wonder about the maker and how she developed such a keen sense of color. The antique dealer thought the fabrics dated to the 1930s. Perhaps these bright colors brought smiles during the Depression. I have it on my dining room table for a while--just so I can look at it every day.

I recently bought a package of teflon hexagons to make some new hexies in contemporary colors. You run a basting stitch around the fabric which is cut 1/4" larger than the template, pull the thread tight, then press with a hot dry iron. You remove the template before using the hexagon. I like that idea of not having paper to remove later.

Today is one of those "hurry up and wait" kind of days. The TV repairman is due any minute and my new computer is scheduled to arrive sometime today. Think I'll ready some of those hexagons for a hand project....better than twiddling my thumbs!

4 comments:

Ali Honey said...

Those quilts are wonderful.I am sure you treasure them.

Do you know about using Angelina Fibres ( you iron it lightly to fuse it ) to make insect wings? (it's semi see through and sparkles) Cheers Alison.

KC Quilter said...

Yes, I do know about Angelina. I bought some at the Paducah show last year. It is really neat stuff! I have played around with it but not used it in a project yet.

Judy said...

Those are beautiful quilts! I used Quilt Paties. They are thick plastic and you do a running tack stitch around the basting then when they are sewn together you put a chop stick in the center hole and POP out the hexagon and use it again.

Holly said...

**clapping hands** There's the GFG I saw earlier! Now I see the whole thing. Soooo pretty. So is the antique.