Another Quilt Trail

I don't know how long this has been an active quilt trail, and I will need to contact the Five Rivers Resource Conservation and Development organization to find out more, but I have added Houston County to the side bar. If I am missing any that you are aware of, please e-mail me at" barnquilter@gmail.com and I will update the list of Barn Quilt groups.


Celtic Quilt Trail
By: Debbie Schmidt & Sharon Knight

Houston County has now joined several counties in Tennessee with its own quilt trial. This one is like no other, however, in that it depicts Houston County's unique Celtic heritage. Each quilt square has a distinctive pattern with its own individual story.

Artist Debbie Schmidt, who organized the quilt project, and scores of volunteers worked feverishly during the past few weeks to get enough 8-foot by 8-foot wooden squares sold, painted and erected in time for the 2009 Irish Days celebration. She had set a goal of 12 and although only nine have been erected, two additional ones are waiting in the wings and another three have been ordered.

The quilt trail may be the brainchild of Schmidt but she is quick to divert credit away for herself. “It’s not just me (who has done this),” she said. “It’s a world of volunteers.” Meriwether Lewis workers, Danny Schmidt and Randy Baggett have supplied Schmidt with manpower and equipment to erect the squares in such a way that they are secure.

Schmidt also had volunteers who help draw the designs and volunteers – some of them the same – who helped paint the square. Each square includes the names of the people who worked on it in an inconspicuous place on the front and listed on the back. That way, each person who worked on it can feel a little ownership of the quilt squares.

“There are just too many volunteers to mention them individually,” she said, “and I don’t want to leave anyone out.”The project is promoted through the Five Rivers Resource Conservation and Development organization (http://fiveriversrcd.com).

It is design to bring tourism interest to the county as visitors follow the trail of quilt patterns through the county. Mapping of the Trail and guided tours are planned. We also have hopes of drawing some of these visitors to look at our area as a special place to live or retire.

The Quilt Trail project is multi county and has extended across Tennessee. Montgomery Co.(crazy quilts), Stewart County (civil war quilts) Humphrey’s County, Robertson as well as Houston County (Celtic Quilts) are all working on this project.

read more at: http://www.houstoncochamber.com

I'm back

I have been away from the computer for more than a week, and I returned to find a little news from my Barn Quilt searches done in abstention. There is now a new site added to the Barn Quilt Memories sidebar from Caledonia (Houston County), Minnesota. They are the self-proclaimed "Wild Turkey Capital" of Minnesota. I assume that this mention of Wild Turkey is referring to the bird and not the libation. There is an easy to down-load brochure of the Barn Quilt project, but I was not able to locate the map.

I have found a notice of a Barn Quilt meeting to be held the Blount County Public Library in Maryville, Tennessee at 7:00 on August 12th. (sorry for the short notice) The Appalachian Quilt Trail is a partnership of Clinch-Powell Resource Conservation and Development Council.

There is a story in the Courier-Journal from Louisville, Kentucky about the eight-member "Buffalo Gals" homemakers' group in Stamping Ground, Kentucky, in Scott County. They now claim to have created 147 Quilt Squares for Scott County and beyond, and also have a wonderful web-site. On Sept. 4, the Buffalo Gals will host two free workshops at the UK extension office in Georgetown to teach anyone who is interested the art of painting barn quilts. For more information, e-mail Minch at cminch@uky.edu or call (502) 863-0984.

There is another news story about the Powder Springs Quilt Trail in the Atlanta Journal-Contitution. This is also known as the Southern Quilt Trail in Cobb County, Ga.