Inspired by Fabric: Grandma's Spools

Do you have fond sewing memories of your grandma? Barb Eikmeier turned her memories into a quilt, Grandma's Spools, using her Waddington Road fabric collection. The quilt was recently featured in Quiltmaker magazine. Keep reading to learn more about Barb's design.

"Grandma's Spools" designed by Barbara J. Eikmeier and quilted by Theresa Ward;
featured in Quiltmaker magazine Jan-Feb 2018

Q. How did you come up with the spool theme for this quilt?

BE: My Waddington Road collection is named after the road my grandmother, Mary Martin, lived on. She was a professional dressmaker, and she sewed on a treadle sewing machine. I chose the spool motif to honor my grandmother. The four-spool block is actually called Secret Drawers, which was perfect because my grandma kept her thread in the drawers of her treadle machine cabinet.

Q. Tell us more about that block.

BE: I came across it in the EQ library. In its traditional coloration, it doesn’t look like spools, but when I changed the color placement, it did. I liked that it had triangles in the corner because those tend to make great secondary designs. I added them to the large hourglass block as well. After playing around a bit, I realized that if I reversed the colors of the corner triangles, I would get hourglasses in the block corners.

Q. Tell us about your fabric choices.

BE: I decided on the tan button print first. I wanted that to be a main part of the quilt. I used Painter’s Palette Solids in Rice Paper as the light to add contrast. I really like how the Rice Paper makes the tan look sharper and more crisp. Then I chose all of the greens, golds, reds and blues in collection for the actual spools. I chose the red print for the border because of the buttons.

Q. How was this quilt machine quilted?

BE: Theresa Ward did the quilting. We chose an overall swirly design. After she finished, we both commented on how the quilting almost looked like thread spiraling off the pieced spools.