Customer Reviews

The Farmer's Wife Sampler Quilt: Letters from 1920s Farm Wives and the 111 Blocks They Inspired

5 star:		(40)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(10)
2 star:		(9)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

I received this book yesterday after much anticipation and it is not what I expected. Unlike the Civil War quilt book, the patterns are not diagrammed full size and there are no measurements so it is impossible to make the blocks unless you get the templates from the CD. However, as yet I have not had any luck getting the CD to load. I cannot find any instructions on using the CD anywhere in the book. Also the paper used for the pages is not good quality in my opinion. That being said, this is a beautiful quilt and the letters are wonderful to read. I would still like to make this quilt but unless I can figure out how to load the CD, I will have to redraft every block! If anybody has any suggestions, please let me know.

Added 10-19-09
The CD is fine now thanks to suggestions from many people. It is not a program but just a file of the templates, one per page. Most of the blocks are very easy to redraft and that is what I am doing as I make the blocks. This is really a beautiful quilt and book. I do wish there was a file to print out ALL the templates on a few pages as this would save lots of paper. I also would have prefered the CD to include the full size diagrams of each block. That being said I would still highly recommend this book to any quilter.

Laurie's new book is delightful to look at and, the finished quilt is beautifl even though the fabrics do not reflect the era.

The biggest problem with the book no where does it state the actual size of the template pieces. All 106 templates are one to a page and therefore, you need to waste paper and ink to print these out. Laurie and the publisher should get on board with today's quilter. With effort and patience you could locate these public domain blocks in BlockBase and print from there.

I would hesitate to purchase another one of Lauie's book without seeing it in person.

The book review says "everything you need to create.....quilt." Well, that's not true. The book itself does not contain any patterns. If you just want to read the stories it's very nice. If you want to quilt--things are lacking. In addition to the book you'll need a computer and lots of paper. For quilters who don't have or use computers, having to have the patterns printed for them at a copy store will add perhaps $l0 to $15 to the cost of the book. Some 100+ pages of patterns. As other reviewers have noted that's excessive. One little pattern piece per page. In addition, I didn't catch in the reviews that there are errors in the book. It's necessary to go to the book's website and find a list of errors and their corrections. I've done a lot of sampler quilts and most of those patterns have written and printed pattern instructions on 8 pages or so. Nice stories--otherwise big disappointment, inconvenient, and added expense to create a quilt.

The quilt itself is absolutely beautiful. The up-close color photos of the individual squares are very helpful in choosing colors and fabrics for the quilt. The frustrating part is that each pattern piece, not the pattern for the entire block, is located on a pdf file on the CD and there are no dimensions. For example, the Attic Windows block is comprised of two of the #2 pdf file, two of the #14 pdf file, one of the #1 file, and two of the #3 file so you have to print seven pages (they recommend not copying the printed pieces because they may be distorted). The Shooting Star block requires multiples of eleven different pattern pieces. There are a total of 106 different pdf files for the pattern pieces so it is is more like 111 jigsaw puzzles than quilt blocks. The book recommends that you print all 106 files and put them in a 3-ring binder. Another suggestion is to copy them onto plastic templates and write the number on each one. Because there are no dimensions, you are forced to print a simple square or rectangle unnecessarily when you could have just measured it on the fabric if you knew what size it was. The value of the book is in the history of the quilt and in the color photos of the block. The instruction (or lack thereof) to recreate the quilt is poor.

I LOVE this book. The stories are charming and I find the templates easy to work with. While maybe not a good choice for a first-time quilter (there are no instructions on how to assemble each and every block) I found it easy to put the blocks together (that I have done to date) based on the layout provided on each page.

I would highly recommend this book! Especially for those who enjoy piecing (hand or machine). This book differs from similar type books in that this is a book that you can piece together each block easily from the samples or with the templates rather than having to foundation piece the blocks to get them to work. This would be typical of the era.

I loved the fact that the quilt was pieced in reproduction fabrics!

Yes, I did find the fact that I could only print one template on a page a bit of a bummer, but that's a fix for further editions. It sure did make it easy to print templates quickly as each template was clearly marked.

I purchased this book thinking I had a great set of stories and quilt blocks from the past. Over the last few months as I have been attempting to make the blocks from the "templates" included in the book, I am ready to toss the whole thing in the trash. I have been quilting for 38 years, I cannot imagine just starting out and trying to put this together.

The templates are all placed on an 8.5 x 11 sheet of paper, when the template is 1 inch by 1 inch. You must print out the template in order to make the block, but when you do use the template, it doesn't matter. Because the blocks are different sizes, IF they even go together.

I will not purchase another book by this author, nor this publisher, no facts were checked when creating the templates and obviously no blocks were made, which makes me doubt the "facts" as presented otherwise, also.

The editor should have hired someone to at least check the measurements.

This book was a waste of money. It was a great concept with lack of follow-through.

I received this book as a gift. I loved the stories, the pictures of the blocks and finished quilts. I will probably make this in the future;HOWEVER, I have had trouble running the CD, the first time I tried it worked but I did not have time to print each individual template ( could not several be on one page?). When I went to use it tonight, the disc snapped in half inside the disc hold while running. Any way to get a replacement? For future reference, I feel it would have been helpful to have measurements for each pattern piece that could be rotary cut, thus eliminating printing so many templates. Thanks

To start: Yes, I have read everything related to the CD problems, but I did not find a solution to the problem I had, which is that merely inserting the CD caused Windows to immediately shut down. You can't simply read template documents if you can't use your computer. Over and over this happened, because I could not eject the CD while Windows was shut down, and it took awhile to forcibly remove the CD so that my computer would again boot. As the book is constructed in such a manner as to be utterly useless without the templates, this is a serious shortcoming.

In a comment to one of the reviews, I learned that you can download the zipped files at
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at least for now. But what about later? Will the templates be there in a couple of years? And templates are not the most accurate or efficient method of constructing most of these blocks. Measurements would have allowed an experienced quilter to produce many of the designs in a superior fashion, avoiding the handling of lots of teeny pieces. (These 6" blocks can have more than 30 pieces.)

If you know anything at all about quilting, I think that you are better off with Jinny Beyer's new book, The Quilter's Album of Patchwork Patterns: 4050 Pieced Blocks for Quilters. If you know very little about quilting, I would suspect that you would get quickly frustrated at the tediousness and difficulty of template piecing with such tiny pieces. The absolute minimal thing that should have been done is including measurements. Then experienced quilters -- the ones most likely to finish the entire quilt -- could then choose the cutting and piecing techniques most efficient and accurate for each block. (For example, Triangulations 2.0 makes constructing the numerous half-square triangles a breeze, and does them very accurately, too.)

Buy this book to read. Buy this book to enjoy the photographs, but DON'T buy this book intending to make any of the 111 quilt blocks! First of all, the CD will break almost immediately or soon thereafter. That said, they are very good about replacing it with one that works. However, as you may have noticed, most of the reviewers say: "I can't wait to start making the blocks!" None of them talk about completing the blocks! There is a reason why this is so: without drafting help, they are very very difficult to size and put together. The templates would have you working with bias edges etc. when a simple cutting diagram could avoid this problem. Many quilt shops have drafted the blocks with better cutting instructions and are offering classes using this book. Try to find such a workshop or class before you start making them. It isn't IMPOSSIBLE to make them, but it is very frustrating, disappointing, and challenging, even for a quilter who is very experienced.

The book is very interesting. It's a shame the software is such a dud. And there is no excuse for it. I won't buy the sold separate cd program when I paid for one in the book.