A Scalloped Quilt, Bias Binding, And One Huge Repair

I recently acquired this quilt from my mother in law. It has a long and storied past...

I was helping her clean out one of her storage closets when we ran across it. She had forgotten where she was storing it and thought that maybe she had thrown it away without remembering. It was made by her mother in 1951 as a wedding gift. My MIL never thought it was big enough for daily bed use so she put it away and never really used it. She has many quilts made by her mother, so none of them were particularly special above the others. And when a quilt isn't big enough for a bed it gets put in a closet.

When we pulled it out it was severely damaged. The top and bottom edges were moth-eaten and torn. She wasn't sure what to do with it so she said I could have it and "do whatever you want with it." In the back of my mind I knew exactly what I was hoping to do with it but I didn't tell her for fear that she wouldn't let me have it.

When I got it home I spread it out to inspect the damage. There are definitely lots of places where it is worn, but I could still see the beauty of it and wanted to fix it.

So I cut off the two edges that were so badly damaged, tore off the remaining bits of the binding, and set off to rebind what was left.  I found an almost perfect match to the original green binding in a country cotton.  The color is called Honeydew.

My MIL has asked me about the quilt since bringing it home, so I got up the nerve to tell her what I was doing. Surprising enough she was very excited that I fixed it and am giving it new life at my house.

I was a little bit nervous that I'd end up ruining the quilt, but in the end I figured it was better than leaving it in rags. I am SO happy that I did this. The quilt is still very beautiful to me even if it's not in perfect shape.

I think I'm going to hang it in my living room with the others.  I'm hoping my quilt club ladies will get excited about it when I show them this month, too.