Three Quilts for Carrie: Roam, Stars Hollow + I Spy Shadow Boxes

Today for Finished On Friday I'm sharing three beautiful quilts that I long arm quilted for my client Carrie.  First up is Roam, a BOM (Block of the Month) medallion quilt kit designed by Tara Faughnan.  I wasn't able to locate any Roam kits that I could link to, but you can still purchase the Roam pattern (with or without the accompanying video tutorials) on the designer's web site here.  The back page of the pattern lists all the fabrics used in the BOM kit for this quilt in case you wanted to make one just like it, but I think this quilt would look wonderful in any number of different fabric combinations.  In print fabrics, it would look like a completely different quilt.

Carrie's 82 x 82 Roam Quilt with Diagonal Plaid Bias Cut E2E

I quilted Carrie's Roam with Diagonal Plaid Bias Cut E2E, a simple geometric pattern that emphasizes the strong diagonal elements in the patchwork.  I used King Tut 40 wt cotton thread in Lapis Lazuli and Hobbs 80/20 Cotton/Poly Black batting (this post contains affiliate links).

Detail of Diagonal Plaid Bias E2E in King Tut Lapis Lazuli Variegated Thread

Why the black batting?  Long arm machines use larger needles than domestic sewing machines, and with the thicker 40 wt thread I was using here I needed a size 110/18 needle to get that gorgeous stitch quality in all stitching directions.  Bigger needles leave bigger holes, and with a dark thread and predominantly dark fabrics in the quilt top, those needle holes are less conspicuous when the batting isn't peeking out bright white around every stitch.  Of course needle holes close up when the quilt is washed, but not every quilt does get washed, at least not right away.

Second reason for black batting in a quilt like this is that it prevents dark stray threads from showing through the lighter fabrics in the quilt top.  The Windham Artisan Cottons fabrics in the Roam quilt are gorgeous but they are also prone to fraying.  As neat as Carrie was with her quilt top, there were still stray threads all over the place no matter how many I tried to neaten away.  In that photo above, if I'd used a regular white or off white batting, we would be seeing some stray navy threads showing through the Orchid and Yellow/Copper fabrics.  Navy thread against black batting disappears, but navy thread against white batting will show through a light colored quilt top fabric.

Custom Digital Quilting with Q-Matic: The 1984 Sampler Quilt Continues

 Happy Easter and Passover to all those celebrating this weekend!  I quilted this block over a week ago and wanted to jot down what I learned before I completely forget what I did.  Doesn’t the green airplane look great with the swirly computerized quilting design in the background, but not crossing over the airplane itself?

Q-Matic Masking Tool for Airplane Block

Of course there are quilters out there who could freehand quilt those swirls and spirals just as beautifully as the computer, but sadly I am not one of them.  ;-)  Since a computerized long arm machine is like a talented but blind quilting assistant, it’s necessary to precisely program and “mask out” the areas where you do and do not want the design to be stitched by physically moving the machine along the patchwork seams and clicking at the points to map out boundaries that the computer can follow.  This is a slow process, as I learned when I did it on this earlier block in the same quilt:

Also Done Using Q-Matic Masking Tool

Looks great, but I learned a lot about what NOT to do with that block!  I set up that circles and spirals as a repeating design right across the block as though it was an edge to edge design going across a whole quilt, mapped out the tumbling blocks appliqué, and told the computer to just stitch it all at once.  Then I watched in horror as the many many stitches went in to create beautifully round circles and spirals balls, but every time the machine encountered a seam line it stitched back and forth multiple times to travel to the next stitching line.  There were jump stitches all over the place that I had to go back and trim and way too many places where the design stitched securing stitches.  Not only is this a less tidy look than I hoped for on the back, but it took me a good hour after I’d finished stitching to clean it all up and trim all those jump stitches from both sides of the quilt.  Very discouraging!