Promise Quilt making project

How the Civil War hurt more than just the soldiers

Once upon a time I promised to make a blanket for a friend.  I very quickly discovered it was more of an undertaking than I realized, and looked for ways to get out of the work.

I kept my promise, but only barely.

I was reminded of this story as I read The Promise Quilt for our homeschool history lesson recently.

The Promise Quilt Civil War activity

The Promise Quilt, a Civil War tale

In The Promise Quilt* a father makes a promise he’ll return after the War.  H can’t keep that promise, but his family remembered his promise and made a quilt to help keep his other promises.

That’s the best I can explain it without giving the story away.  I’ll just say it’s super duper cute and I highly recommend it.  It also does a great job of explaining the hardships of the Civil War for those left behind.

 

The Promise Quilt activity

Promise quilt activity

Afterwards they each got a square of white paper and large amounts of construction paper to cut up and make into a quilt of their own.

My kids happily went about mutilating paper and making confetti and gluing pieces down.

Promise Quilt making project

Our friend, who’s more of a perfectionist by nature contentedly made a four patch quilt and declared himself done.

And then two out of my three kids absconded with their pictures, before I got my own picture, so just imagine the marvelously wonderful quilts they created out of scraps of paper……..

Promise Quilt project

 

So, I leave you with Princess’ “quilt”  It’s quite impressive array of colors and shapes.

 

Interested in more Civil War ideas?

 


Comments

9 responses to “How the Civil War hurt more than just the soldiers”

  1. MaryAnne Avatar
    MaryAnne

    What a quilt! I love that your kids take activities and run with them like this.

    Thanks for linking up!

  2. An Almost Unschooling Mom Avatar
    An Almost Unschooling Mom

    I'm glad I don't have to piece that! It does look like a very enthusiastic effort.

  3. I think my daughter would have been a 4 patch quilt maker (less if she could get away with it). The book looks interesting!

  4. LOL I love this post. You are very funny. My kids always want to take their projects away to play with them, too. Sometimes at the end of the year their folders are practically empty. At least I have recorded what they did on the blog!

  5. Love their quilt, or the after affects of the quilt. Selena would love this.

  6. Looks like a really fun project.

  7. JDaniel4's Mom Avatar
    JDaniel4’s Mom

    That is one crazy quilt.

    Thank you for linking to Read.Explore.Learn.

  8. Hahaha…One of my boys would have made the four piece quilt and ran off and the other would have made the wild quilt like your princess did. Kids!!!

    I would love to invite you to come join us on my brand new link party of children's activities (Hey Mom, Look What I Did) at Adventures In Mommy Land.

  9. What a fun idea! LOVE activities based on books! If you are interested, I'd love to have you link up at https://livinglifeintentionally.blogspot.com/2011/10/first-ever-linky-party.html

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