Molly B Quilts: signature quilt

I had such an amazing time creating this twin sized quilt for my grandmother that I just want to share it with a wider audience. The quilt itself is nothing revolutionary in terms of design and the construction isn't as perfect as it could have been.

But for me the process of making this quilt was so very special and heartwarming.

I loved soliciting signatures by mail, learning to embroider just to do the signatures, thinking about each family member as I worked on each block, and I loved giving it to my grandmother.

I put a lot into it and I hope you enjoy its story. Check out the lengthy original blog post with many more pictures here.

Thanks for stopping in!

Molly

Signature Quilt for Grandma Phyllis

Almost a year ago I got the idea to make a signature quilt. I planned a design and sent out a letter to my aunts, uncles, and cousins. Included in the envelope was a piece of white fabric, a letter describing what to do, and a cardboard cutout guide to help people know how big to sign on the fabric.

As the signatures began to trickle in I started piecing them into blocks and embroidering the names. I chose to do the ladies in pink, the men in blue, and my grandmother in black.

It took a while to get all of the signatures rounded up. I had the pleasure of waiting for the names of the two newest members of the family!

I spent a long time rearranging blocks. I ended with an arrangement that had all of my grandmother's children touching her block. From there, the blocks of each immediate families' members were also touching. There had to be some empty blocks so I tried to position them next to the families who might still be growing.

One block is in honor of "those who have gone before us".

In my quest to decide on the right backing and binding fabrics, decided it needed a border. I love the diamond border. A few of those corner squares had to be fudged just a bit to make the points match.

A solid, almost periwinkle, blue became the backing fabric. I used the remaining 30s prints for a scrappy binding, which turned out great.

Then came the quilting. Obviously you don't want to quilt over the names, so it was trickier than normal deciding what to do.

I machine quilted each square of four colored triangles--in the ditch above and below the signatures.

That wasn't enough quilting though, technically (per instructions from the batting I used) and aesthetically because the quilt was a bit poofy in the corners of the blocks.

So I decided to tie the quilt also. At the corner of each block (in the middle of the four-triangle-squares and where the four points of white come together) I tied with two pieced of white embroidery floss.

Here it is folded just right and in our family's special box we reuse every year and lovingly call "the box," which I just so happen to have been in possession this year.