Lydia Lee Hobbs

I dug out the quilt my great-grandmother, Lydia Lee Hobbs made in 1959. She was almost completely blind and my grandmother, Martha Hobbs Fee, would tell me stories of Lydia piecing the quilt and quilting it by hand, feeling her way across the quilt. The stitches aren't perfect, the rows aren't either, the quilt is done in white and black thread and it is probably the most beautiful quilt I've ever seen. It's the one that made me want to quilt as a kid. Lydia inspired me in that she was so adept that she could make a quilt when not being able to see what she was doing at all. She just knew how to do it. WOW!

The quilts that both Lydia and Martha made were purely utilitarian, using old clothing for patches and leftover material from when making clothing. It wasn't until I was grown and married that I realized there were fancy crazy quilts, dresden plates, etc. but the utilitarian quilts were the ones that whispered in the back of my mind to one day learn how to quilt. In January 2003, my dear friend Pamela Kervin patiently taught me how to make a design, cut, piece, sandwhich and finally quilt and bind my first 'real' quilt. Since then I have almost ravenously started stash building. Mostly I fell in love with every kind of quilt I saw, it has only been this year that I have started to develope a style of my own and really refine the look I want in my quilting.

As a side note on Lydia's quilt, the binding was originally a light blue. My mother replaced the binding a while back because it had started to deteriorate. Yes, she machine sewed it which would mortify all purists I know, but in the spirit of my grandmothers, they would have done the same today too. Remember, this was a utilitarian quilt and if my great-grandmother could have used a sewing machine she would have to have made the quilt in the first place. The neatest part of this is, when I repair the seams that are pulling apart, add a sleeve and a label, 4 generations of women in my family will have worked on this quilt. Cool, huh?!