Every now and then I make the trek to the Chicken House Flea Market between Stephenville and Dublin, Texas, to look for vintage crochet. Sometimes I’m lucky, especially the time this filet crochet peacock turned up in one of the shops for $1. 00. That is not a typo. It cost one dollar.
It took a while, but I finally made a quilt using the crochet panel. To showcase the crochet, I used my usual style of sewing the crochet onto a plain background. Then I make a piano-keys border. In this case, I added an extra piece of floral fabric below the crocheted panel to keep the final piece from being too long and skinny.
A lot of the piano-keys fabrics were from the scrap basket at the weekly quilting bee I have been going to for years. It’s fun to sort through the scraps and bring home a few treasures.
The wide keys with the showy flowers were from fabric that belonged to my friend Peggy’s beloved mother-in-law, Alice. Alice was a hand quilter and tried to convince Peggy to be a quilter, too. Peggy couldn’t imagine taking so very long to finish a project. It was only when she was invited to a quilting bee where quilters machine-pieced and -quilted, that Peggy took the plunge and became a prolific and excellent quilter. Another thing Alice did was to help Peggy find her first well-fitting thimble. Peggy doesn’t hand-sew without it.
After Peacock in the Garden was quilted and bound, it was button time! As usual, I enjoyed combing through my buttons to find iridescent buttons and more. They frame the crocheted piece and cover the uneven edges. I sewed pinkish, orangey, and red buttons, in groups of three, to the floral panel under the peacock. It didn’t have nearly enough flowers to start with. The buttons took care of that.