Vintage Patchwork Pup

Last month, my niece and I went to an Art Walk at a local antique store. The rear of the store was furnished with several 'walls' of spaces which are rented to local artists to display and sell their craft.

I hope to display my paintings there soon. More to come on that...

We, of course, love anything vintage, so we browsed the aisles for interesting and unusual pieces of history and just plain fun stuff! It's always fun to see something in an antique store that you have at home!

We came across this little Scottie patchwork doggie - isn't that just the cutest thing?

The wheels started turning in my head...I can make one of these!! With that same thought, my niece exclaimed, "YOU can make one of these!" 

I have collected vintage fabric scraps from boxes given to me over the years. (People love to give you fabric when they know you sew and as a rule, a quilter throws NOTHING away!)

I save my squares in produce clam shell boxes - these are just a small sample of my collection!

Soaking away!

 

Water is very dirty!

 

 

 

 

Sew...*insert smiley*...I picked a bunch of squares already cut from my stash of oldies. They were very old and a bit grungy so I did my magic by just soaking in some Oxy dissolved in warm water. After an overnight soak, I rinsed - yuck...just look at that dingy water!

Squaring up to 2 1/2"

I laid out on a beach towel to dry and then ironed each one nice and flat. Since they were probably cut with scissors back in the day, I thought I should try to make them all one size for easier assembly. So I took my rotary and squared them close to 2 1/2".

Front - 22 squares ~ Back - 22 squares ~ Sides - 28 squares

Laying them out in Puppy shape was fun! There are 22 squares for each side - remember to make the puppy mirror images. You also need 28 squares for the outer edge which joins front to back. So a total of 72 scrappy squares is all you need for fabric supply!

The next step is to sew the rows top to bottom, alternating pressed seams for easier joining. Once you have the front and back pups all sewn together comes the difficult part.  

Lots of pins and patience are needed to match and go around inside and outside corners. Take your time and it will go together just fine! I left a 2 square opening by the tail on one of the seams to turn right side out. 

Note: clipping the inside corners is key to making them fall into place nicely.  



Now for the finished pup!

I see that this pup turned out a bit larger than the one in the store...I think I would use 2" squares next time to reduce the size..but I do love this one!