Serious over the top free motion quilting seems to be all the rage right now. While it sometimes looks awesome, sometimes it seems to take away from the piecing. There is also the debate about the comparison between the cuddle factor of intensely quilted quilts versus less densely quilted. Many seem to side with a less densely quilted quilt being more cuddly. I also read recently that less densely quilted quilts are warmer because there is more space for air to be trapped.
This quilt has a lovely and soft pink Minky cuddle fabric on the back because my daughter in law LOVES Minky. She also lives where it is very cold in the winter and as she has a February birthday, this will wrap her in warmth from the very beginning. But Minky is heavy. Therefore, I did not want to do a walking foot quilting going back and forth from top to bottom or side to side over and over again. I love the fresh and clean look Rita from Red Pepper Quilts has with her quilts that mostly have straight line quilting with the walking foot. Red Pepper Quilts I want the piecing to shine, but it is hard to wrestle a quilt this size and weight by myself.
I had asked a long arm quilter what she would recommend. She took one look at the photo and said an all over pattern. My fear was that would still leave me having to move the quilt great distances in my pursuit of a continuous overall design. You see, I am still not that proficient.
Stroke of luck, I found in my supplies 3 inch stencils. They would fit perfectly in the white squares and the print square centered in them. Then I could free motion stitching in the ditch around the 4 pointed stars. Loved that idea. I left on my trip, came back ready to get started.
First morning, out of bed, I began by laying out the batting on the floor and had my dear sweet man crawling on the floor with me to use spray adhesive to attach the top to the batting. Then I laid out the Minky. I was displeased with the feel of the finishing chemicals on it. Also it had some pretty intense wrinkles from how it was placed on the bolt. SO, change of plans. I put the Minky in the wash, sent hubby to work and he would help me finish when he came home for lunch.
I just like to "get 'er done", but since I had the delay, I thought I probably should practice my stencils. Oh boy, what a disaster! One side was fine, but when I began to sew the second half, sewing blind by going backwards, the sides were definitely not symmetrical. 3 different designs and none very good. Also I had trouble with the pink chalk markings being hard to see. So I practiced sewing straight lines free motion style. I could do that. Change of plans, straightish (as Angela Walters says) diamond shapes. I marked my diamonds with frixion gel pens. Later I threw the quilt in the dryer so the heat would remove the markings.
13 hours later I emerged from my sewing room with the quilt quilted to suit me!
No comments:
Post a Comment