Visiting My Vintage Fabric

1930's "Pussy Willow" fabric


I have been visiting my vintage fabric, I have several boxes scattered about my sewing room. Most of it is from the 1920-30 periods, but some may be newer and some older. I can usually tell the 40's stuff, as it is brighter and bolder. The 20's and 30's are more pastel, lighter fabrics, some "Cute" prints, a lot of plaid and work shirting, tiny little prints and calicos, and some fun stuff. Almost all of it has come from garage sales, though some from friends (thanks Margie, Vi and Suzie) I usually get bags of small scraps, tho sometimes I do get yardage. The first bag I ever got was a green garbage bag full of SMALL pieces, they wanted $1, but all I had was 50 cents on me. I started cutting it up into 1 1/2" squares, as that was as big as many pieces were, and as I went along I found larger pieces. I made a complete quilt top from that bag, by adding only muslin. I have done other small projects with the vintage fabric, several wall hangings with 6" block "Dresden Plates." Making the Dear Jane blocks has giving me an opportunity to use my growing stash. It is surprising how much fabric you need to make a 5" block, I think I have enough of a scrap, but it just won't stretch. The seam allowance on the pieces adds a lot of volume. I have lots of vintage solids as well, I have separated them out, and am using them as contrast in the blocks instead of muslin. Unfortunately the dark/light contrast is reversed for many of my blocks, as my prints are lighter and my solids darker. Jane's blocks have darker prints, with off white muslin for the background. But I don't want the solid to be the main pattern of the block, I want it to be the background, this has made it a challenge to select fabrics, as well as the limited supply of a certain print. My favorite fabric so far has been a red print with little white cat faces on it. I couldn't quiet figure out why there were green lines running through it. Then it dawned on me "Pussy Willows" I have scanned it and included it here, it is just so cute!!