Some reorganizing is occurring at Blisstree, and the Arts and Crafts section will be discontinued, as far as new posts are concerned.  You should be able to find my previous posts if you’re interested in them.

It has been a great deal of fun sharing with you at b5, first in a Quilting and Patchwork blog, then through the Arts and Crafts section when Blisstree was formed.  I won’t be leaving Blisstree because I shall still be blogging at the Parenting section.  I also write the Home Biz Notes blog, My Organized Biz blog and Small Business Boomers.

Since I won’t be writing about quilting at Blisstree,  I’ll refer you to my personal quilting blogs, Qulters’ Potpourri and Tales of the Trails End Quilers for further information. 

Image: sxc.hu

I haven’t posted much there while I was writing about quilting for b5media and Blisstree.   So to keep my readers updated on my quilting interests, discoveries and heritage, I’ll begin again.

Also, you might want to check out my daughter, Beth Mastin’s quilting blog, Meandering Threads, for her input on quilting and a quilter’s life.

(Incidentally, you’ll still be able to find my previous quilting and arts posts at b5.  I simply won’t be writing new ones here.)

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Quilting at Mary Emma’s Quilting Blogs

Kara Mastin quilt; image by Kara

Now Kara is going to college and wants to take GG’s quilt with her.  Many of the ties had come out so it needed re-tying.  As she tied, and then her mom joined her, I thought, “The legacy of quilting goes on in our family.”

Beth, when she was Kara’s age, had helped me tie the original quilt for GG.  Now it had come full circle.  A grown-up Beth was working on the quilt with her daughter.

It’s also something I must write about for my Trails End Quilters blog, where I relate my quilting heritage.

(The quilt above was made by Kara for a project in American Studies.  It’s based on Civil War era patterns with Civil War reproduction fabrics.  Kara also is taking this to college.)

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Tying Great Grandmother’s Quilt

Image:sxc.hu

My quilting heritage descends from the Trails End Quilters.  The ladies who lived at Trails End Farm were my ancestors.   My mother and aunt also grew up there.

I’ve been fortunate to have a cooking notebook that my aunt compiled.  In it she includes recipes from her grandmothers, her mother, other relatives, friends and neighbors.  It’s somewhat a cooking history of the ladies associated with Trails End.

 (Incidentally, it was called Trails End because….the farm was at the end of a dirt road or “the trails end.”)

Ah…to have the time to compile these recipes into a family cookbook, with photos and stories about the Trails End family and friends.  This is another way to preserve one’s family heritage and pass it along to future generations.

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Cooking with the Trails End Quilters

 Memorial Day in my childhood meant traveling to Trails End Farm, where my mom grew up and her parents, sister, brother and his wife lived.  Sometimes the day was celebrated with many relatives gathering there. Or we might visit, about ten miles away, the “Barrytown Coons,” my grandfather’s cousins who lived in the village of Barrytown, NY, along the Hudson River.  (These families would alternate between the two farms for Memorial Day and the Fourth of July.)

The food was delicious, the gathering of relatives fun, and the occasion something special in memory.  I’ve come across photos of the collection of the clan and found I needed to write the name down so these times wouldn’t be lost to future generations.

Thoughts of Trails End Farm brings to mind my quilting heritage.  There my grandmother taught me to make my first quilt sitting in the farmhouse kitchen with her.  My grandfather wrote about his mother attending quilting bees.  My mom told about quilting with her mother and grandmother.

Now my daughter, granddaughter, and I carry on the Trails End Quilting heritage and memories of Memorial Day.

(c)2008 Mary Emma Allen 

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Memories of Memorial Day and the Trails End Quilters

Tales of the Trails End Quilters blog consists of stories about my quilting heritage. 

My quilting heritage began at Trails End Farm in Milan, New York. There I often sat beside my grandmother cutting squares and sewing them by hand. Eventually I realized that my mother and her sister, their grandmother, and others made quilts here, too. Now my daughter, granddaughter, and I carry on this Trails End quilting tradition from our New Hampshire home.

 I delve into the genrations of quiltmakers in my family, going back to my great grandmother.  I know she quilted and attended quilting bees at neighbors’ homes because my grandfather, her son, comments on this in his writing.  (He kept journals as well as writing for the local newspaper in the late 1800’s and early 1900’s.)

Stories of one’s quilting heritage and memories of quilts and “blankies” made by ancestors and living relatives have great meaning to many quilters and non-quilters, as recognized by guest posters and visitors to my blog.  (You’ll also find reference to these and other stories at the Trails End Quilters blog.)

(c)2008 Mary Emma Allen

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Quilting & Patchwork Mentioned on Tales of the Trails End Quilters

 As I read my grandfather’s writings, Fifty Years Ago, Rural Life from 1876, I was delighted to realize he had included information about his mother’s quilting at Trails End Farm, in Dutchess County, NY.  I know from this that my quilting heritage definitely traced back to my great grandmother, Mary Barker Coon.

 Papa Coon, as our family referred to Burton Barker Coon, writer and farmer, mentioned the women getting together for afternoon tea and cutting out pieces for quilt blocks. 

“They would take their sewing along and have a very pleasant time.  All the girls were brought up to piece quiltsk, bake bread and do all kinds of household chores,” he related.

Then he mentioned quilting bees when four or five neighborhood ladies came to help.  “Needles and tongues would vie with each other in making bed spreads and history,” he wrote.

Papa Coon called each quilt a “sort of souvenir piece.”

Are you researching your ancestry to see if you have quilters in your heritage?  Are you making quilts now as souvenir pieces for future generations.

I’d love to hear about the quilts in your family history.

(c)2008 Mary Emma Allen

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Trails End Quilters of the 1870’s – My Quilting Heritage

Quilters and fabric artists create memories…some of recent projects, others we made longer ago, and perhaps some connected with quilts stitched by former generations.  Do you write about your memories and events connected with them?

They can be recorded any number of ways:

• Blogs
• Journals
• Scrapbooks
• Videos or DVDs
• Published materials

Quilts from my family heritage, as well as projects my daughter and granddaughter are undertaking today, I write about at Tales of the Trails End Quilters. Along with the quilting memories, I’m including bits about the quilters and the history of the Trails End Farm where my quilting heritage began. 

Blogging is just one way you can record your quilting and family memories. 

What are you doing to preserve yours for yourself and future generations?

(c)2008 Mary Emma Allen

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Are You Recording Your Quilting/Family Memories?

Cyndi at Layers Upon Layers and Noreen at Hankering for Yarn tagged me for the 7 Random Facts Meme that has been going around.  I participated in it previously, but there are always facts and ideas I can relate that you’ve not heard before.

1. I like old quilts and finding the stories connected to them.
2. My granddaughter is making a quilt for a school project using a Civil War theme with reproduction fabrics from that era.
3. My daughter had one of her fabric art pieces displayed at a gallery in Costa Rica.
4. I like to work on the smaller pieces since they’re easier to take with me when I travel.
5. My daughter makes exquisite fabric postcards.  (Check out more of them at her Meandering Threads blog.)
6. I’m researching my family’s quilting history for a series about the Trails End Quilters, along with family recipes, note cards, and reproductions of my painting of the Trails End Farm.  I currently have a blog about this, Tales of the Trails End Quilters,  http://trailsendquilters.blogspot.com . 
7. The Missouri Star design was one of the most difficult I’ve made, especially when I jumped into it during the early days of my quiltmaking.  However, the quilt for a customer turned out lovely.

I’m not going to tag anyone for this meme because it has been making the rounds in some form or fashion for quite some time.  However, I’d love to have you participate voluntarily by naming 7 Random Facts about you and your quilting, either here in the comments or on your blog and linking back to Quilting and Patchwork.

(c)2008  Mary Emma Allen

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7 Random Facts About Quilting & Me