A fun challenge

I was invited by Lori of Humble Quilts into a challenge to do something with an antique quilt block.  It began in Houston last year at the International Festival.  We met up together with some other quilters and Lori gave us each a quilt block to do something with.  Shown above is what I made.  

And this is what I started with - this Lady of the Lake quilt block.  I was initially drawn to it because I loved the pink fabric.  The navy fabric was rich and wonderful too.  

I made the tough decision to take it apart.  It was very wonky and the white shirting print was damaged and stained.  I had mixed feelings about taking out stitches that had been there for a 100 years or more.  As I snipped I wondered lots of unanswerable questions.

How old was the seamstress?  Did she enjoy sewing/making quilts? Did she live in the city or on a farm?  Did she make any completed quilts?  What did they look like? Why did this block remain as a set of unfinished blocks? What would she think about me taking out her careful stitches?  The thread was really thick - thicker than the handquilting thread that I use now - was that all she had?

After it was apart I shopped in my stash for similar reproduction fabrics.  I had this shirting print that was almost exactly the same.  I knew I wasn't going to be able to use much of the original shirting so I was really happy about that.  The pink and the navy were a little harder to match.  I used what I thought was closest.

I love star blocks - I couldn't resist. I had only triangles to work with so it was a good way to use them.  I made one star that was mostly the antique fabric and the other stars I assembled with what remained mixed with the reproduction fabrics.  

I played around with the setting :0)

I decided fabric this old deserved to be handquilted.  I got a good start on it.  
 If you look closely you can see the one pink triangle that I pieced from scraps to make it work.  This was such a fun project - it was really wonderful to get to sew with these beautiful old fabrics.  Thanks so much Lori!  

Will somebody one day in the future do something similar with one of my ufo's??  

Happy Quilting!