Lincoln and Fellow Compatriots

Hi Everyone,

I'm finally getting to show and tell about my Lincoln Schnibble.  I always read the pattern directions and sometimes read a whole quilt book from cover-to-cover.  You never know what tidbit might be in there.  I particularly enjoy Carrie Nelson's patterns because she always says something about how she names them.  In the case of Lincoln, she mentioned how there are 13 stars and striped blocks and Lincoln seemed to be perfect. 

As I mentioned before, I would have been really happy to make up a nice red, white, and blue patriotic version.  I may still!  However, I got a little hung up on the title.  I went to my stash and began to look through things.  I began thinking of many of our other Presidents--I guess since we had just visited 4  Presidential homes this month, I had them on my mind.  Then I remembered this fabric:

I bought this several years ago.  I fell in love with it.  It is supposed to reproduce the look of the old cigar silks featuring Presidents.  While I really like it, it isn't the easiest fabric to work with.  First of all, the portraits are rectangular.  It is really hard to use rectangles in quilting--especially something that looks traditional.  Second of all, the colors are a bit...  strange.  Some of the backgrounds of the portraits are cheddar, some just cream, some greenish, and even a few pink ones!  The red is a very dark wine.  I just couldn't figure out how to use it.

I considered using it for Lincoln.  I measured the portraits and compared them to the size I would need for the star squares.  My fabric was a bit too big.  I decided that wouldn't be too bad, I could make the blocks slightly larger.  In this case they finish at 5."  What about fabric to go with, though?

I took the fabric to one of my local fabric stores and found some red nearly exactly the same as the background of the portraits.  I got that for the star points.  I decided on a simple cream for the background of the stars.  The solid fabrics really let your eye focus on the portraits and helps the stars stand out.  Those blocks were easy.

The other block in the quilt is a rail fence.  What colors could I use for them?  Red, white, and blue?  I didn't really like anything I was pulling from my stash.  Then I remembered the new line of Historical Blenders Collections for a Cause.

 

The colors seemed like they would go great, except for the reds, so I got a jelly roll.  I was right!  They went really well with the Presidential fabric.  I pulled all the dark, winey red from my stash and cut strips from them, and then pulled out some blues and backgrounds from the jelly roll (along with a few more from my stash) and made the rail fence blocks.

As I fussy-cut the Presidents, I realized that I had every President up to the 1900s.  There were 24 of them.  Lincoln had 13 star blocks, so not only was I going to make my blocks a little larger, I was also going to have more of them.  I was able to use the same layout as Carrie did in Lincoln, only with more blocks.  The numbers even worked out perfectly!  This is how it came out:

It is really a masculine quilt!  Not only because it is full of men's pictures, either, but also because of the color palette.

Here is Mr. Lincoln himself.

 

 

Here is William Henry Harrison who took a chill during his Inauguration and died of pneumonia just a few weeks later.

 

 

This is James Monroe--the owner of one of the homes we visited in Charlottesville.  He  consistently comes out as one of the best Presidents after the top 5 or so.  I'm not sure what criteria is used, but that was one tidbit we learned from our guide. 

 

This is Grover Cleveland.  He was elected for one term, was defeated after it, and then won the next election, so he served two terms, but not consecutively.  Another interesting fact:  he ordered a baby carriage for the daughter of his good friend Oscar Folsom.  When Oscar died, Cleveland became guardian for the child when she was 11.  When she turned 21, she married Cleveland in the White House.  I believe it is one of a very few marriages by a President while in office.  It's a little creepy, if you ask me.  At 21 she is the youngest ever First Lady.  I'm actually featuring him because he was a very distant cousin of my Great, Great Grandfather--thus making him my cousin as well!

 

 

 

I took it back to my favorite fence for some photos.

 



I'm really pleased with the crisp cream in the background of the star blocks.  I'm afraid if I had used something darker, they would have blended right in to the rail fence blocks and the whole thing would have been a bit muddy. 

We are off on another trip--we are headed to Niagara Falls for a few days.  It is near the top of my bucket list to visit and ride on the Maid of the Mist.  I'm pretty excited.   I'm crossing my fingers that Kate has the royal baby while we are there.  Canada celebrates the birth by lighting the falls either pink or blue---I think it would be fun to be there to see!

Here's a question for you:  If you were the car phone charger that I just bought prior to our trip to North Dakota, and haven't seen since, where would you be?  Please don't say "still in the rental car in North Dakota!"

Have a great day!
JoAnne