Bear Claws Quilt Canvas Farm Barn by Billy Jacobs
My mom is going to commission a barn quilt for the side of their machine shed in the country. If they still had the old barn (which is just down the road), you can bet it would hang there on the old homestead ... I was even thinking about building it and presenting it to her for Christmas, but I wasn't sure how to transport it without a truck ... I even found some good directions for making your own here. But she beat me to the punch. Now we're just planning to chip in to cover the costs for her. She says she wants it to be a Tree Block, since my dad has a Christmas Tree Farm there on their land.
They don't have to be the 8 x 8 ft size. If your hanging space is smaller, by all means, you can make a smaller barn quilt. And these instructions recommend a material that is used for making signs--instead of plywood. That seems smart--It might stand up to the elements better. Then I started to think about : If I made my own, what quilt block would I use? Pin Wheel? Tea Leaves? Crossed Canoes? Bear Paw--That's one of the quilts on my bucket list that I need to make some day. So I started looking for examples ... What color schemes? How did they lay it out? Square or on point?
That's when I stumbled upon the artwork above. I bought it on eBay this week--an impulse buy, but not expensive. ;-) This way, not only do I have the Bear Paw barn quilt, I have the barn to go with it! And I can hang it inside and enjoy it myself! Perfect!
My Quilting friend, Laura R. built a potting shed this summer, and made a Barn Quilt to go with it. She chose The Lady of the Lake quilt block. That's the patron saint, shall we say, of the local Oshkosh Quilt Guild, Lakeside Quilters, which she helped to found so many years ago.
Do you have a Barn Quilt?
Did you make it yourself?
Do you want a Barn Quilt?
What Quilt Block did you choose? Why?
I might still make a real Bear Paw Barn Quilt some day. It would be neat for people to look across the park and see it hanging on the side of our house ... But maybe I should make the quilt first!
In the meantime, here's a whole Library of blocks to whet your appetite for barn quilt possibilities!
1 comment:
That's a beauty - I see why you "impulsively" bought it. It reminds me a bit of Diane PHalen's work. Bear Paw has been on my quilt bucket list forever, probably starting with a plaid wool quilt using the block that I saw in a women's magazine long before there were magazines just for quilting. I had lots of leftover Pendleton wool from shirt making back in those days. Maybe still someday...
I wouldn't mind having a "barn block" for the front of my townhouse - all the units on my street are identical so at present I hang out a paper quilt block when I know someone is coming by. I could get by with a foot square one, and I probably don't have to tell you which block - the Idaho Beauty block of course! Now there's another quilt I thought I'd have made long before now and even have fabric set aside for it. My, but we do get sidetracked.
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