Selvages and Paper Dolls…

A fiber arts group I belong to has a monthly challenge to make a small journal quilt (8 1/2” x 11” or so) designed around a theme. I like to participate and use the small project as an opportunity to try new techniques, or to incorporate small bits of things I’ve accumulated in the sewing room. This time our theme was “Memories”. I was a great fan of paper dolls when growing up, and have fond memories of cutting them out and playing with them for hours upon hours. So when I found some cute images of Dolly Dingle, a character designed by artist Grace Drayton in the 1930s, I wanted to include one in my journal quilt. The characters she designed became the iconic Campbell Soup Kids, but were also a series of paper dolls, and even a series of embroidery patterns for redwork blocks. I never had the Dolly Dingle paper dolls, but did make a few of the embroidered blocks. I printed this Dolly Dingle image on fabric and placed it on a background made from selvages. Isn’t it funny how we have memories of our fabrics? So often when looking at someones scrappy quilt, I’ll hear quilters say, “Oh I had that fabric!” Often I say it myself, and may even remember where I bought it! So these memorable selvages got included in the piece. I also added a vintage hankie- remember when your great-aunts had all those lovely hankies in their purses? I used to select hankies for “grandmother gifts” from beautiful stacks in department stores. One challenge for me was to practice “writing” with my sewing machine, and using the twisted fabric “rope”  (shown in my previous post) for the binding. A little button trim, and I called it done. We haven’t discussed what to do with all these journal quilts yet, but we’re  sure having fun making them. I think I’d like to bind mine into a book at the end of the year. Next up- July and “The Beach”. Ideas are percolating already.