Girl's Joy Quilt Block

    
     I found the pattern for this 8" Girl's Joy quilt block in 5500 Quilt Block Designs by Maggie Malone.  It was originally published by Ladies Art Company.    
     In this diary entry, Grace is a neighbor and a hired girl.  Ted is Hattie's almost-15-year-old brother. 

Saturday, July 8, 1916 -
"It has been a long day.  I was up before 5:30, and it is now nearly eleven.  The others have all been complaining of the heat, but I have not felt warm at all.  I cleaned downstairs this morning, and this afternoon I cleaned my room and did several other things.  Then I rested a little and mended and helped Grace fix her dress and then had a bath and dressed for supper.

"Ted was in such an awful accident this afternoon that we all feel very thankful to think that he escaped with so few injuries - a sprained ankle and considerable scratching.  Some way the mules jumped a ditch and caused the slug rake teeth to go down into the ditch, and Ted was hauled ahead of the team and then run over and dragged a little ways under the slug.  My!  How near that was to being very dangerous, perhaps fatal!  But he is very brave and good about it and is resting." 

     Howard H. Woodbury, great-grandson of Fred H. Woodbury writes, "Most of Fred's farm work was done with mules.  Mules couldn't be worked to death like a horse because a mule, unlike the horse, would quit when he got tired instead of working himself to death.  Three mules were used on the walking plow. . . Woodbury Farms acquired its first tractor in 1922.  It was an eight horse-power Woods tractor that was used to grind cattle feed and saw wood to heat the big house."  - from "Woodbury Farms: 104 years of continuous ranching in the East Central Kansas Flint Hills" by Howard H. Woodbury, 1985 

You might also enjoy reading my previous blog post:
 http://www.starwoodquilter.blogspot.com/2012/02/fourth-of-july-quilt-block.html