Saturday, January 5, 2013

Week 19 - Old Maid's Ramble



My Grandmother Faye was born on January 7th, 1892. This coming week would be her 121st Birthday.  We are fortunate to have a baby picture of her, even if this one is only the reproduction in Aunt Alice's book.


We are also fortunate to have the shoes she wore to her 1913 wedding, two decades later. Joyce and her husband helped me out and took these photos of the now-worn shoes, beautifully staged on their Christmas tree skirt!


Joyce took clearer pictures, but we decided, like Hollywood does for older actors, a softer focus was kinder on these nearly 100 year old beauties. Faye may have used them for other occasions because they are well scuffed and missing a button or two. But I cropped one of the high quality photos so we can appreciate the beading that decorates the toes that would have peaked out from the skirt.


Fashion by 1913 dictated skirts that showed the shoe tips. I couldn't find any images that were not copyrighted, but I took a slightly off-kilter photo of a framed Butterick Patterns image I have on my wall to illustrate. Click on the image to see the ladies on the left who are from the Spring of 1913.



We don't know ahead of time which block will be featured each week. A week or so ago, I sent an email to my sister to ask if she would photograph the shoes for Grandma's birthday blog post. I knew that the block this week might be something that would prompt a completely different story, but I wrote all of the above yesterday.  This morning, I was astonished to read the history Ms. Brackman chose to share behind the choice of Old Maid's Ramble. It started by discussing women walking but being discouraged from physical activity. I already blogged about Faye playing basketball, but tying the shoes in to women walking everywhere? It gives me goosebumps.

When choosing fabrics, I decided to feature my grandmother's wedding shoes in the block.

I selected an area of the beading and gave it a slightly green-yellow cast, then duplicated and mirrored it for printing on cotton fabric. 

4 comments:

Sherrye said...

Cheryl, what an interesting block! Copying the shoe design makes it look like you have put beading on the block,too. I love this one, not only for the block itself, but for the story behind it.

Becky in VA said...

Your block is lovely and the story about your grandmother's wedding shoes makes it very special.

My Grandmother was born on January 8, 1897. Happy birthday to our grandmothers!

diane said...

Love those shoes and that they have been kept and appreciated. Your family posts have been most interesting and thanks for sharing.

Dorry said...

You have been so creative today. How are you going to be able to give this project away? What a treasure trove you have to draw inspiration from.