Decisions and Thought Processes

No matter what kind of quilt you make, at some point you must figure out how you will quilt it.  Maybe you like stencils.  Maybe you trace someone else's design. Maybe you draw your own designs.  No matter the origin you have to figure out placement, marking methods, thread choice and factor in your own capabilities.

I'm almost ready to quilt.  I have the thread except for the order that should arrive today.  I have the batting and backing.  I have 2/3 of the quilt sandwhich pinned together.  I wanted to try using Misty Fuse, but with blue marker designs all over I cannot use the iron....so back to the old faithful safety pins and a bandaid on one finger to prevent abrasion.  I tried a thimble, but it was too annoying.

One more problem to solve.  I have a one-inch, dark blue border on the outside of my quilt.  I have tried a wider border on the digital version of the quilt, but one-inch is what speaks to me.  How am I going to quilt it, considering that I need to have room to put a binding on it too?  More problematic is that the quilting design must not get caught in the binding unless I do something like stippling or straight lines.  The dark blue abuts a medium blue and I tried dense, straight line quilting across the seam.  No go.  I don't like it, and trying to use two thread colors was mind-bending, and my mind refused to bend.

Reject!

I could do diamonds as I will be doing on a one-inch border within the quilt, but I was afraid I would have trouble lining up the points and not catching them in the binding.  Perfection might be hard to achieve.  On the other hand, it would echo the quilting on an internal border.

Diamonds on the tester do not sing for me.

Now I am contemplating a tiny feather line, but I will have only 5/8 - 3/4 inch, and I can't let it get caught in the binding, but it is more flexible than the diamonds.

Should I do it after I sew the binding on the front, leaving it open to be hand-sewn to the back later?  It works nicely on a tester, but I don't know about the corners.  Time for another tester.

I like the feathers and they echo the rest of the quilting designs.  Click to see large
and you will see the binding seam at the top sewed before doing the feathers.

What about blocking?  Block it after the binding is stitched to the front and quilt when dry?  Will the after-the-blocking stitching alter the shape?  I know the quilt can be blocked after the binding is on.  I can also block it before sewing the binding down on the back.

I could mark the border with a ceramic pencil and keep the feathers on the inner side of the line  Block and bind after stitching.

This is what I will be contemplating as I sit down to stitch every seam in the ditch, before doing the fun, decorative quilting.  It will be awhile before I have to make a decision about that border.

TIP:  Take the time with thought processes such as these.  Do the testers.  You will be more likely to end up with a product that you like.

Sew a happy seam this week.  I wish you lots of ideas from which to choose.

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Near Death Situation

I had a near death situation this afternoon.  My sewing machine began to clank and chirp.  My husband listened and said, "Stop right now and take it in."  So I bundled up to beat the major incoming snowstorm, drove an hour off my mountain, and visited my very accommodating sewing machine guru.  Of course  the ornery thing didn't clank and didn't chirp for him, and his diagnosis was that it is OK.  He said to take it home try again and if it still makes ominous noises bring it back.  Sure thing....in the predicted two feet of snow???  Not going to happen until the roads clear so, dear machine, you had better work!

 I have feathers on my mind and the final border awaits:  a 2 1/2 inch width to quilt with feathers.  I am told that all quilting designs should be worked out when you first start planning your quilt.  I disagree.  As I piece my fabrics I get better acquainted with my quilt.  I suck in ideas from all around me.  I create ideas in my head.  I think about quilting in my dreams.  Finally, except for fillers,  I sit down with my pad of tracing paper and start drawing.  Many times my planned designs land in the trash and I end up with totally different ideas based on something I just saw somewhere.  I don't start drawing until an idea crystallizes and that sometimes doesn't happen until I am ready to work on a particular part of the quilt.  That's OK...for me anyway.

Here is the paper design for the spokes I mentioned last week.  I was so excited as I liked the look.  I printed the feathers on Sulky Sticky Fabri-solvey, but realized immediately that I had a problem. I thought that the size of the drawing was exactly the right size, but too late I realized I should have printed it smaller.  Oh well, that didn't spoil the idea so I printed a sheet the right size and stuck it to the quilt.  Then my needle gummed up very badly as it tried to negotiate the adhesive and two layers of batting.  This definitely was not going to work.

Tracing paper design

N.B.  I have used the Sticky Fabri-solvy successfully before and have recommended it to you.  However, I think the problem here was the thickness of the batting or maybe they have changed the adhesive.  Whatever the problem, it didn't work this time.

TIP:  Measure before you print, measure before you sew, test ideas and products for each individual quilt, exercise your mental flexibility.

I have read of quilters who draw the spine of a feather on their quilt, and then let the needle figure out the feathers.  I am a line-follower and was reluctant to do this.  However, on my dark fabric, I could see no other solution.  I began hesitantly, and guess what, I did it!  I have drawn so many feathers on tracing paper over the years, and that skill just communicated itself to the needle.  I learned a few things as I progressed through twelve spokes, and I am happy with the results.

After much figuring of dimensions and practice with pencil and paper I have finally started the outer borders...free hand.  I marked only circles and spine on my quilt.

Basic design marked with white ceramic Sew-line pencil

Incomplete freehand feathers.

TIP: When you are practicing with paper and pencil take careful notice of where you have to erase.  What was wrong with that line?  How can you avoid sewing a bad line like that?  Solve the problems ahead of time so you don't have to "erase" your sewing.  Train your eye to look ahead.

TIP:  Bite the bullet and try something new!  Draw your ideas on paper first.  You may be in for a big surprise as to the capabilities of that needle.  I certainly was.

BTW my sewing machine was not sick.  I have always had problems winding the bobbin on this machine and it ends up with a rat's nest at the beginning.  That's what was jamming up the works.  My faithful repairman showed me a different way to wind the bobbin (not in the manual).  I can pass the thread through an almost invisible, tiny hole in the top of the bobbin and hold the thread end until the thing gets to winding properly, then cut it off.  So easy...and it works like a charm!  No more snarls from me or the machine.

Bella Bella Blue

I saw a fascinating quilt hanging in a local quilt store and loved the color and design.  I asked about it and quickly bought "Bella Bella Quilts" by Norah McKeeting, which I read through carefully.  I had to make one of those quilts and I settled on the one she calls "Venice Rose."  I call mine "Bella Bella Blue."

Bella Bella Blue 72" x 72"

It is made in an interesting way with excellent instructions in the book.  No sense going through the whole process here.  The design is constructed with two spokes, one the reverse of the other, and they are quite long.

The two spokes of the wheel.

The pattern comes with the book with paper piecing directions.  Instead of using the usual foundation material I used freezer paper.  I did it the usual way, but instead of sewing through the paper I ironed it down, folded it back, added the next piece of fabric, and sewed alongside the fold, catching only fabric.  I found I needed to put a pin in the last piece sewed just to be sure the pattern didn't slip.  This thing gets to be a snake by the time it is finished.  The freezer paper foundation can be used over and over and there is no paper to pull out later.  Putting the spokes together requires great care in matching the angled seams.  I did and redid many of these intersections.

TIP:  Matching seams is critical for a top notch result and a good method is shown on this website.  She talks about getting points right, but the same method works for matching seams.

TIP:  You have tried twice and still the seams don't come together with precision?  Carefully pin again as directed in that website, then turn your quilt over and sew it together from the other direction.  This almost always solves the problem

As to adding the circular border, I direct you to the book.  I designed my own appliqué, but I didn't want to needle turn the edges, and I am not crazy about satin stitch (probably because I don't do it well).  I discovered Ricky Tims' "Rhapsody Quilts" and was interested in his method of using machine blanket stitch for appliqué.  I used it on my motifs and was very happy even with this first attempt.

The quilting is all feathers with one in every piece of every spoke.  In the diagonal joins I did a wiggly grid.  It is hard to see on the front in these photos, but here is what the back looks like.

Backside shows the quilting.

My problem #1:  I ran out of the dark blue.  I had that fabric in my stash for years and loved it, but it never quite went with anything else.  Finally, here is the place for it.  Then I ran out!  Fortunately, I had a piece of selvedge, which showed that it was a Jinny Beyer fabric and I was able to buy an expensive one yard online.  I finished the quilt with a small handful of very small scraps.  Too close for comfort.

TIP:  Figure your fabric before you sew!  You might not be as lucky as I was to still be able to find an almost outdated fabric.

My problem #2:  I carefully marked the quilting design with blue marker on the white and a Clover iron-away white marker on the dark.  By the time I finished quilting the first two spokes the white marker rubbed off all the rest of the quilt.  The blue marker stayed the duration.

TIP:  Test your marker by rubbing it with your hands and scrap fabric.  If it doesn't stay you may have to mark as you go along, which is what I did.  Remember, practicing the quilting design with a marker will help you do a better job with the quilting.  I love the "SewLine" ceramic marker, and it has different color refills.  It rubs off and if there is any residue, it washes out.

Blocks in a Border

The next steps in this Lifetime quilt were so much fun.  The idea behind the quilt was to catalog the things that have been important in the lives of my husband and myself.  I have a book which has blocks that are associated with every state in the union, "Create Your Family Quilt Using State Blocks and Symbols" by Barbara Brackman.  From this book I used blocks from the states in which we have lived and other blocks that represent things we remember and love.  There are no patterns in the book so I drafted them on the computer.  I also picked some blocks from other books and designed the columbine block.

The first set of blocks each have a 1/2 inch dark blue border and they are set on point and finish to 5 inches.  For newbees, this means that they are placed on the quilt with the points along the quilt's vertical and horizontal lines.  You can see what I mean in the following photos.  This means that the space around them must be filled in with something.  The filler I chose was pineapple log cabin triangle, which I paper pieced.  You sew a strip to each side of the triangle and put a cap on them, then do the next layer, etc.  They echo the inner log cabin border and provide and interesting background for the blocks.

Pineapple Log Cabin in Illustrator

In the Illustrator design some of the blocks are rotated the wrong direction.  This really doesn't matter because the drawing is always an approximation, no matter how precise, of the final result in fabric.  Once the blocks were made I laid them out on my bed and spent time running around arranging and rearranging until I had the blocks so that they pleased my aesthetic.

Side blocks in Illustrator

To assemble this border you sew one edge of the triangle block to one edge of the square block.  Then you do the same with the opposite edge of the square block.  This gives you a strip on a 45º angle.  Once you have all the triangles sewn onto all the blocks you sew the angled strips together.  No Y-seams to mess with.  This may be on a 45º angle (like bias), but all your edges to be seamed are on the straight grain of the fabric.

Assembing the squares and triangles.

In the fabric version you will see that I added a 1/2 dark blue border on the inside edge.  Eventually I will put the same on the outside edge, but that will wait until I get the top and bottom borders done.  The original design had a rectangular pink strip on the top and bottom of each side border, but the collection of 5 inch blocks came out slightly taller than Illustrator determined so I added the pink border all the way across to finish the top and bottom edges.    No, the finished quilt will not have a horizontal ratio!

Fabric side borders added.

TIP:  If you get into self-design, be flexible.  Sometimes things don't work out as you had envisioned. You have to be the kind of person who can adjust and come up with solutions to problems as they pop up.  Borders and/or blocks of fabric can equalize a design that goes sideways.  Take your time deciding what to do.

Lifetime Disaster

No, this was not the disaster of a lifetime, but it was a temporary disaster for the quilt named "Lifetime."  It definitely takes perseverance and flexibility to turn out a nice quilt of your own design.  When I think of it, the same thing can happen with a purchased pattern when your chosen fabric doesn't work like you had envisioned.  Has that ever happened to you?  Do you throw the pattern away, or do you dig in and figure out what will solve the problem?

I had this idea of a floral border, but before you feast your eyes on this colossal ugliness and say, "Yuck," please realize that my idea was to create a 4 1/2 in border with Watercolor technique.  Pinterest has a full page of beautiful Watercolor quilts if you are unfamiliar with them.  Due to the difficulties of constructing my idea on Illustrator, I just scanned the fabric into the computer and relied on my imagination to eliminate much of the yellow and green, so this looks pretty gross to both of us.  I swallow my pride so that you can follow the process.

Floral border in Illustrator - Blahhhhhhh!

I cut my little squares using the pink, red, and purple flowers, eliminating all yellow and including just the necessary green.  I arranged the squares so that all four sides of the border were pretty much the same and sewed them all together.  It really turned out pretty and I was very pleased.  I sewed those borders on without even previewing the potential result.  I couldn't wait to see the finished product, but when I did, I almost cried.  It just didn't look right.  OK, it looked awful.  I folded it up and left it sad and alone while it waited for seam ripper treatment.  After I removed the offending borders, I got out a couple of border books from my library and began to work on Plan B.  (Incidentally, I subsequently made another quilt for the borders and they look really nice there.)  I decided that my Lifetime quilt has a formal, traditional look and that is why the floral didn't work.

A zig zag border is what saved this poor quilt.  It is made of triangles, which were easy to work with although the many bias edges had to be treated with care.

Bare bones of zig zag border partially assembled in Illustrator.

Zig zag border assembled with corner in Illustrator.

Happy at last, I added a 1/2 inch border around the inside and outside of the border using a dark blue print.  Now, isn't that a major improvement?

Lifetime with zig zag border in fabric.

Stay tuned.  It's not done yet.  The best is yet to come.

TIP:  Disasters happen.  If yours is no worse than a wrong choice of fabric you are doing well.  It is worse when fabric gets ripped or cut accidentally.  Try to figure out where the design went wrong.  Look on the bright side and take a walk with your imagination, spurred on by online sites and books until the solution occurs to you.  It will, sooner or later.

TIP:  I've said it before, but will repeat it often.  Be gentle with those bias edges.  Guide them carefully under the presser foot without pulling.  I am an inveterate pinner and it really helps in sewing bias seams.

TIP:  Don't forget your design surface and preview each step before you sew.  It is much more efficient than ripping out those little stitches.

Blue Block Border

The next border is rather plain, very easy and didn't measure out to fit the preceding steps.  This can be an ongoing problem with a self designed pattern.  Nobody has made it before and you never know what monkey wrenches are going to inject themselves.  I have many years of sewing experience, and try to visualize the technical aspects of my design and properly incorporate them into the pattern.  Doesn't always work.  Here is the next border:

The light blue, two inch squares are fussy cut from blue floral fabrics to emphasize a flower or a grouping of flowers.  They are pretty much a medium to light value.  I surrounded them with 1/2 inch dark blue sashing.  Piece of cake (or cloth)!  The problem was that I either had to fill in the ends or change the size of my blocks in order for the border to fit the previous border.  I didn't want to change the size of the 2" blocks so I pulled out some pieces of Paula Nadelstern fabric that was designed to go with the fabric I used in the center Mariner's Compass and fussy cut the pieces to mirror at the mitered corner.  It does the job although I have never been crazy about those corners, but I couldn't come up with another solution that I liked better.  Sometimes I sit and stew over a problem like this and other times I just go with it as I did here.

Lifetime so far in Illustrator

Lifetime so far in fabric.

TIP:  Do you know what "fussy cutting" means?  It is when you carefully cut out a particular element or grouping from a fabric.

I use translucent template material available at any quilt store and cut it the size of the finished piece plus 1/4 inch seam allowance all around.

Mark the seam allowance on all sides of the template and mark any distinctive lines that will guide you to place the template exactly the same on the next piece you cut. Since you can see through the template you may be able to see where you want it without marking.   Depends on how much precision you need.

Place the template on the fabric and mark around it with a fine, black marker (it won't show on the finished quilt because it is on the outer edge of the seam allowance) or if the fabric is dark use a white gel pen or fabric marker.  I often use 1/4" double sided masking tape to fasten the template temporarily to the fabric.  It is available at Joann's and probably other quilt or craft stores.

Cut with small, sharp scissors on the marked line.  This leaves your fabric with gaping holes throughout!  If this bothers you, deal with it.

TIP:  If you hit a problem in your quilt it may help to put it away and work on something else for awhile.  You could also skim through your books, check the library, go to a quilt show or fondle fabric to come up with a new idea.  I find that time usually solves the problem, often while I am sleeping.

Medallion and Borders

A medallion quilt is made up of one border after another around a center motif.  You can see my first medallion quilt in an earlier post.  It actually lies flat and straight on a bed, but is hanging wonky in the picture.

Another medallion quilt is my "Lifetime" quilt, and you can refer back my March 12 post for a photo of the quilt's centerpiece Mariner's Compass.  You can follow the building of that quilt in the next few posts as I relive its construction from design to finished quilt.  You may have noticed that I mentioned a narrow, 1/4" border around the center motif.  A tiny, narrow border does not need to be scary if you do it right.

Start by cutting a strip of fabric the appropriate length and 1 inch wide.  That gives you 1/4 inch for the border itself, two 1/4 inch seam allowances, and 1/4 inch extra.

Sew the border strip to the centerpiece with an accurate 1/4 inch seam (see the TIP below).  Press the seam making sure that it is fully ironed so there are no pleats at the seam line.

With the pressed centerpiece and border to your left (for right handed quilters), lay your good ruler with the 1/2 inch line at the seam that connects the centerpiece and border fabrics.  Cut off the excess 1/4 inch with your rotary cutter, and you will have a perfect 1/4 inch seam allowance for attaching to the next piece of fabric.

I use this method for larger borders too.  It gives a measure of safety and keeps the measurements precise.

TIP:  I find a 1/4 inch Edge Stitch foot invaluable for stitching quilt seams.  See the little guide on the right side of the foot?  It rides along the edge of the fabric and allows the needle to sew a perfect 1/4 inch seam.  You will probably need to move your needle to the right, so take the time to measure and find out where the needle needs to be to create the perfect 1/4 inch on your machine.  By moving the needle this foot can be adjusted to sew greater or smaller seams…to a point.  Accurate seams allowances are critical for precise piecing.  Check with your dealer about getting one of these.

1/4 Edge Stitch foot from Husqvarna

If you can't get a foot like this for your machine, you can attach 2-4 layers of narrow masking tape to guide the fabric edge.  There are also numerous seam guides available made by different companies. Many of them adhere temporarily to your machine.