Camping with the girls - fancy quilting on busy fabrics

Some quilters say that it doesn't make sense to put fancy quilting on busy fabrics in scrappy quilts because the quilting doesn't show very well.  That is one approach.  Another alternative is to use fancy quilting to add even more texture to the quilt.  It all depends on how much time you want to put into the quilting.  I am growing fond of Camping With the Girls.  I plan to keep it for myself.  I want it to be special so I don't care how much time I spend on the quilting. 

I collect good quilting stencils in assorted sizes.  (Why would I collect bad ones?)  Then I wait for opportunities to use them.  For this quilt, I was able to select 4 different stencils to fill space.  This is one of the spaces to be filled.

This is the stencil I selected for the space.

It would be difficult to mark a fancy shape like this well enough to see on the fabrics in the space to be filled .  In addition it would need to be done for each of the 12 blocks in the quilt.  In the end this visually-challenged quilter would have trouble seeing the markings well enough to quilt.  An alternative is to use Golden Threads paper.  This involves cutting the necessary size squares from Golden Threads paper, marking the quilting design on one of the squares, pinning up to 15 layers of the paper together, and then stitching through the layers with your sewing machine (no thread in needle).  The end result is that you have up to 15 pieces of the paper with the design marked on it.  You'd want to use a heavy needle such as a jeans needle to make the perforations more visible.  These are the papers with the perforations showing the quilting design:

Notice the beautiful fabric in the background.  That is the upholstered seat of my relatively new dining room chairs.  A little Christmas gift to myself.  Back to the subject at hand.  Notice that the layers of Golden Thread papers were pinned together so they wouldn't move during stitching.  I used to do the perforation step free-motion which was quick and did not involve turning the paper.  Now I use the walking foot with the stitch length set on 1.5.  This results in greater accuracy and perforations that are closer together, which makes it easier to remove the paper after quilting.

The Golden Threads paper is not cheap and is only available in pale yellow.  Someone told me you could just buy regular tissue paper in whatever color is best for the current project.  I tried that and will never do it again!  Regular tissue paper is not as durable as Golden Threads paper so it made a terrible mess.  It was awful.  Really.

When ready to start quilting, peel off one of the papers and attach it to the area to be quilted.  If you look at both sides of the paper, you will notice that one side is smooth and the other side has bumps.  Place the paper on the quilt with the bumps up.  That side is easier to see.  Pin the paper along the edges to hold it in place.

Determine a good place to start quilting to have the minimum number of starts and ends.  This stencil was a continuous line design with one start and one end.  I make it a habit to quilt the right half of the design first because it is usually necessary to roll the quilt on the right in order to quilt the left half of the design.  Be sure to replace the jeans needle with a normal needle prior to quilting.  Don't try to pin all of the papers before rolling the quilt.  The papers will get torn due to the rolling and handling.  Pin each paper when you are ready to quilt that block.

Next comes everyone's least favorite step - removing the paper after stitching the design.  Some quilters wait until all quilting is finished and then remove paper while watching TV.  I prefer to deal with it one block at a time.  If left until the end the papers get torn and little scraps get distributed all over the room.  I am not a fan of cleaning so I try to keep things neat as I go.  This also allows me to examine my quilting stitches to make sure tension is good before moving on to the next block.  I find it helpful to have good tweezers to remove little bits of paper that are stuck under the stitching.  After I think all of the paper is out of the stitching, I use a pet hair pickup brush to get the tiny pieces. 

Then I admire the block that I just quilted.  I get up, move around, have a drink of water or some beverage of choice, and then move on to the next block.  It's good to have breaks when doing very precise work.

After I have quilted all the fancy shapes in the entire quilt, I will probably add some stippling which will make the quilted designs stand out more.

I love quilting fancy shapes!

Camping with the girls - milestone

The ditch quilting is complete and all the pins are out.  That is always a milestone.  I've selected 4 stencils for some fancy quilting.  There's been a little despair.  My free motion ditch quilting is not as precise as I had hoped. 

Camping with the girls - let the quilting begin

The quilt is pinned - rather heavily I might add.  I am a very methodical pinner.  For each block I determine the best way to pin considering how it will be quilted.  It then follows that all blocks will be pinned the same way.  There are 11 pins in the star blocks, 13 in the Delectable Mountain blocks, and 16 in the four-patch blocks.  I use a lot of pins because the first step will be to quilt the long vertical and horizontal seams between the blocks and I want to keep the intersections of each group of 4 blocks as square as possible.

It took a long time to upload that picture.  I had to eat cookies while waiting.  Anyway...

I am using one of my favorite battings, Quilters Dream Cotton, in Request (thinnest) weight and Aurifil 50/2 thread in tan (color number 2325).  I put a new Schmetz Microtex sharp needle (80/20 size) in the sewing machine because there are thick seams in some places.  (Normally I use Schmetz Microtex Sharp 70/10 with the 50/2 thread.)  The stitch length is set on 2.3.  The walking foot is on.  I am ready to start.

I am at the stage where I think this quilt is going to be great.  At some point (generally around the half-way point) it is inevitable that I will despair and think it is not going to be great because one thing or another didn't turn out as well as I hoped.  At that point you just have to forge ahead and work through the despair.  As I hit the home stretch, I am usually very happy with the quilt.

Camping with the girls

This is a Miss Rosie's Quilt Co. pattern called Elizabeth.  I named my quilt Camping With the Girls because I purchased the pattern on the way to one quilt camp and pieced the blocks at another quilt camp...and no boys were present at either camp!  The quilt is 68" x 68".

I just finished sewing all the rows together so ignore the fact that it is not quilted yet.  Ignore the amateur photography with distorted blocks and poor lighting.  Ignore any stray threads you might see with your eagle eyes.  While this quilt is not exactly the same coloring as the photo on the pattern, it has the same look.  I love, love, love a quilt like this.  It is warm and cozy and comforting.  Bright and white quilts don't create the same feeling for murky me.

The quilt contains three kinds of blocks - Sawtooth Star, Delectable Mountain, and Four-Patch - set on point.  This makes the quilt interesting, but it also complicates the pressing.  The pattern gives good directions, which I did not follow 100%.  I thought I knew better, but that was not always true.  However I would probably do it my way again if I ever make this quilt again.  I can be stubborn.  Oh, yeah.

The quilt is actually a medallion design with the four Delectable Mountain blocks in the center.  Then there is a row of Sawtooth Star blocks on all four sides with Four-patch blocks in the corners.  And so forth.  This is a closeup of the quilt center:

Normally a medallion quilt is assembled from the center out.  Because all of the blocks in this quilt are the same size (8" finished), the blocks are sewn into rows and then all of the rows are attached to each other. 

There are at least fifty prints in this quilt.  That makes the top more interesting and creates a texture before any quilting is done.  The lightest prints are in the background of the star blocks and in part of the Delectable Mountain blocks.  There is a range of tan or taupe with red prints in the Delectable Mountain and the Four-patch blocks.  The centers of the stars are shades of red with some rust mixed in.  The star points and Delectable Mountain points are a range of browns.  A few prints had green or blue in them.  While piecing, I occasionally wondered if a particular block was going to be too different to use with the other blocks.  If so, I would make a replacement block.  In the end, all of the original blocks were used.  No replacements were needed.

Here are closeups of two other sections of the top:

Next step --> prepare the backing and pin the quilt.  I chose not to mark quilting lines because the fabrics in the top are too varied and generally too dark for easy marking.  This top may require a Golden Thread paper solution.

Playing with my nickels

I have been playing with my nickels, a.k.a. 5" squares of cotton.

These are not to be confused with nickels, a.k.a. 5 cent coins.

These nickels are not equal.  5" squares cost more than 5 cents.  Some quilt shops sell charm packs which are usually an assortment of 5" squares from a collection.  Charm packs are a good way to get a sample of each fabric in a line and a good way to get an assortment of fabrics for scrap quilting.  When purchased, the squares average 15-20 cents each.  I rarely buy the "ready made" charm packs. 

Some quilters cut virgin fabric into nickels.  Virgin fabric is fabric that was purchased, but has never been cut into and is therefore still in pristine condition.  I don't do that.  I cut nickels from remnants of finished projects when the pieces left over are too small to fold and stack on my shelves.  If not used this way, the scraps might have been discarded.   This makes me feel very economical.

Nickels are easily stored in a Rubbermaid tub.  They are great to take along for a sewing day at someone's house.  They eliminate the need to plan ahead and cut pieces for a project.  There are even books showing many blocks that can be made entirely from nickels.  Enough about the merits of nickels.

These 4 1/2" units were made from nickels.

It took 120 of the units to make this 40" x 48" top.

I have enough made for another top the same size.  Both will be donated to a nursing home.

Enjoying my stash

I am the kind of quilter who likes to collect great fabric.  Then someday I use it.  Once in awhile I keep it too long and no longer love it, but that is a different story.  For years I collected fabrics that would be good for baby quilts.  I had absolutely no idea how those fabrics would be used.  Last week I went to my stash to find ingredients for a baby quilt.  My eyes settled on this delightful, funky plaid:

There was enough for the background of a quilt.  I decided to pull fabrics to match the colors in the plaid.  This is what I selected:

The red on the right was perfect because it had bits of pink that matched the pink on the left.  The yellow was good because it had a lot of variation, looking bright yellow in some places and orange in others.  I chose not to include a fabric the color of the deep blue in the plaid.  It seemed too bold for what I had in mind. 

The pattern was one I'd made many times so it went together quickly.  The block are set on point.  The quilt has setting triangles.  In the past I've cut all setting triangles from the same fabric.  This is the first time for using scrappy setting triangles.  This is the finished (unquilted) top:

It's a happy quilt!

I will cut bias binding strips from the plaid.  Today I hope to find the perfect back for it.  Can't wait to see it finished.

Quilting the big ones

People often ask how to manage the bulk of a large bed size quilt on a home sewing machine.  The one I am working on now - Big ZZ - is 95" x 95".  I am still quilting the long vertical zigzags in the ditch.  I started by rolling the quilt from one side to the center zigzag.  I put it under the machine with the roll on the right and the unrolled portion to the left.  I wish I'd taken a picture at that point.  The roll seemed really big. 

After I had quilted in the ditch on both sides of one zigzag, I removed the pins from that zigzag.  Removing pins is a milestone for me.  Makes me feel encouraged.  Then I quilted the next vertical line and got to remove more pins.  Another milestone.  After I had quilted several more vertical lines and removed more pins, I started thinking the the roll was no longer so big.  More encouragement. 

This is how the quilt looks right now.

The first thing I ever read about packaging the quilt said to roll up both sides towards the center and to keep the package neat and compact as you worked.  Every time you unrolled the right side, you were supposed to roll up the left side.  I tried that, and it did not work for me.  I spent too much time and effort trying to keep the package neat.  My machine sits on top of a table so I don't have a large flat quilting surface.  It seemed like the roll on the left kept jerking the package in the wrong direction and making my quilting eratic.  Eventually I decided that it was better to keep the left side piled up so it was free to move around and less likely to get caught on the corner of my machine. 

Notice the chair pushed up to the table in the lower left corner of the picture.  That is a quilting fence.  It keeps the quilt from falling off the table and jerking the package in the wrong direction.  There are also 3 chairs pushed up to the table on the opposite side, but they are not visible in the picture.

The child in me is wondering how many more vertical lines I have to quilt before I reach the edge.  It's an are-we-there-yet thing.  The adult in me does not want to unroll the package to find out because it would require me to take it out of the machine and roll it up again.  That is not my favorite part.

Back to quilting.