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Knots of thoughts!

6/10/2025 0 Comments

After Toast & Coffee

We are now all set to "get a-quilting."  The living room in the small turquoise-coloured house, had been noticeably cleared out and four kinda odd looking, painted light-green, wooden chairs sat waiting.  They seemed really low for sitting on and Grandma was soon to point out that Glenn, her husband, had done that to make them into "quilting" frame supports.  He'd sawed off about two inches from the legs - mmh, I wondered what that meant.  The chairs had spindles up their backsides with a back slat near the top and two large finials at the top.  Standing alongside, against the wall, were 4 long planks of wood about three inches wide which I was sure we were going to use, just wasn't sure how yet.
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The instructions began.  Set the four chairs out to form a rectangular space.  Then, place the wooden pieces around the edges using the higher topped finails to help position them.  Using clamps, secure each of the four corners formed by the planks doing your best to make the corners "square."

Once that was pretty good, a large piece of material, that was actually two panels of flannel sewn together, was shaken-out. 
Each of us were asked to assume a corner and grab the material doing our best to stretch it out on the "frame" so that it was taut.  Jars of really well-used thumb tacks were nearby and handed out with Grandma showing us how to "tack" down the material along the top of the wooden slats.  At first, it seemed easy-going but a bit longer into the exercise, our thumbs sure began to ache - all those except for Grandma's of course!

Then, the layer of quilt batting was spread out followed by the third layer, another large piece of 2-panel flannel.  More and more tacking followed as we tried to become creative looking for ways to somehow lesson the pain of pushing in the little tacks.  Time for a break . . . where is the hand cream! ...​to be continued.
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6/7/2025 0 Comments

A Bit of History

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Grandma Smith on the left with Nora Sitler (friend, neighbour & co-quilter), on the right.
How I ended up loving and then making Tied-Quilt Blankets is because of a remarkable woman, Margaret Smith (originally named Marcella who ended up being known as Margaret - but that's another story), my husband's Grandma Smith.  Most of her life was spent being a very active community member of the very small town of Wardsville, Ontario, located in Southwest Middlesex, Ontario, Canada, roughly halfway between London and Chatham.  I noticed, the first time travelling there, that there were no road signs announcing the town, it just popped up on you all of a sudden as you crossed the town line upon arrival!
The newspaper clipping here on this site, from the Bothwell Times in 1986, noted that she was revered as being a "Quilting Expert", and that was so true.  Her work as a quilter never ended, it was in her DNA.  She would be up in the wee hours of the morning, stitching away in her living room where the lighting was the best.  Making tied quilts came to be many, many years after being a prolific block and applique artist creating show-stopping works. 

My introduction to making a tied quilt happened one summer.  A trip was planned where I would join my mother-in-law Rhea and Grandma's daughter Evelyn to "quilt" for a couple of days.  In my mind, I'm thinking we'll pull off one quilt, one of the larger ones, a 78" by 100" double-bed size blanket.  But no, Grandma had another plan.  Instead, the day meant putting up and taking down 4 double-bed size blankets starting, yep, you guessed it - not longer after the sun had risen and we'd squeezed in a coffee and some toast - what a day!
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    Author

    Gloria Smith, a computer geek, an artist and writer who's a little crazy about wanting to share the wonder of flannel, Tied-Quilt Blankets!

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Last Updated June 2025
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