Custom Quilting Background Fills on My Jingle Appliqué Quilt

Happy Wednesday-Before-Thanksgiving!  Is today a cooking/baking day for you, a traveling day, a cleaning day, or a decorating day?  For me, it's a QUILTING day!  This has been my week off from quilting for clients, and I've been hustling along with the custom quilting on my own Christmas quilt, hoping to get it finished and ready to display for the holidays.  I just wanted to pop in and share a few quick images of my progress so far.  This is the portion of the center medallion that I was able to mark and quilt yesterday:

Center Appliqué Medallion with Background Fill Quilting In Progress

By the way, before I go any further I should mention that the pattern book for this quilt, Jingle Quilt by Erin Russek, will be on sale tomorrow through Monday for C&T Publishing's Black Friday and Cyber Monday site wide 30% off holiday sale event.  If you've been thinking you might want to make your own version of my Jingle quilt, or you've had your eye on any other quilting or crafting books from C&T Publishers, use the codes BLACKFRIDAY30 (valid November 24-27) and CYBERMONDAY30 (on November 28) to get 30% off your order.  (Yes, this post contains affiliate links, blah blah disclaimer blah...)

Seriously, I can't recommend Erin's patterns and instructions enough.  This is my very-first-ever appliqué project after years and years of admiring appliqué quilts and thinking they were too difficult for me to attempt.  Erin's instructions are so clear and her methods are goof-proof, even for beginners.  

If the idea of tackling the whole Jingle quilt is too daunting for you, Erin's pattern includes instructions for just doing the center medallion as a wall hanging, or you could choose any one of the blocks for a festive holiday throw pillow, just to try out Erin's prepared edge technique to see how you like it.  

So anyway...  I've been working on the background fills this week, the decorative quilting that smashes down the areas surrounding the appliqué motifs, hopefully in a way that emphasizes and enhances the appliqué rather than competing with the appliqué for attention.  That's the goal anyway.  I thought I'd show you what that looks like in progress:

Rulers, Washout Blue Markers, and Free Motion Squiggles

I know a lot of quilters swear by the purple markers with ink that disappears (supposedly) on its own in 2-14 days, but every time I try those markers, the ink starts vanishing within 10-15 minutes, sometimes before I've finished marking an entire design and often before I get the whole thing quilted.  Don't know if it's because of lotion on my hands, humidity in my studio, or what, but I'd rather just use the washout blue marking pens that I know will remain visible until I brush water on the marks to remove them deliberately!  I like to remove the blue lines from an area as soon as I've finished quilting there, because with my 50 weight So Fine thread matching my background fabric so closely it's not always easy to tell which blue lines already have quilting on them and which lines still need to be quilted.  This being my own quilt, I am 100% positive that none of my dark red or green fabrics will bleed onto the background fabric when they get wet, either.  And how do I know that with such certainty?  Because I have already been through the bloody battle of unstable dye with this quilt, and I came out victorious!

There Is A Mistake In This Block.  Maybe I Will Fix It, Or Maybe I Will Not!

The cardinal block above was the very first appliqué block that I made for the quilt, and I started with that one for the background quilting, too.  It took a ridiculous amount of time to travel back around the appliqué shapes and stems to quilt that trellis design with the background fills, and I accidentally quilted that dense filler in a small section that was meant to be left unquilted.  Decided to keep going with the quilting for now and decide later whether to go back and painstakingly remove those teeny, tiny stitches.  

This One Went Much Faster!

Doing the simple squiggle/stipple quilting around the floral block shown above went a LOT faster!

Third Appliqué Block Quilted

Not sure whether that last one is finished, though.  Although marking and stitching those straight lines and smooth circles took a fair amount of time, it didn't mash down the background fabric as much as the way I quilted the first two appliqué blocks.  I decided to quilt the rest of the appliqué and then look at all of the blocks together to determine whether this one looks out of place and needs more quilting.  Moving right along! 

Disaster Averted, Quilting Can Resume!

Last night -- or more technically accurate, this morning at around 12:30 AM -- I made a horrible mistake right smack in the middle of my quilt, in this design around the central poinsettia.  I quilted that squiggle design down one of the channels that was supposed to be left unquilted, and I did it in manual mode with some of the stitches so small that I couldn't even get the tip of my seam ripper under the thread to pull it loose!  If I left those stitches in, the whole quilt would have been ruined.  This is a reminder that "pushing onward" with the quilting to "just get a little more finished" before bed is a bad, BAD idea!  I think it took me three hours in total, working from the front as well as from the back of the quilt, but I got those dang stitches out and when I brushed water across that area the holes in the fabric closed up and the batting puffed right back up again.  Whew!  I'm using two layers of batting for this quilt, Quilter's Dream Poly Select on the bottom with Quilter's Dream Wool on top.  My thread is So Fine 50 wt matte polyester.  

...And that's all you get for today!  I can't believe it's 4 o'clock already.  😧. Once I complete the quilting in the center medallion, I'll feel like I'm "over the hump" with this quilt, but there are still five more applique blocks needing their background fills quilted, plus the pieced blocks all need more quilting, plus the "frame" borders all need more quilting, plus I probably want to add some detail quilting to some of the larger appliqué shapes...  Y'all, custom quilting takes a LONG TIME!!!  Taking it all one stitch at a time, folks!

Have a happy Thanksgiving, all who will be celebrating tomorrow, and happy quilting!  I'm linking up today's post with my favorite linky parties, listed on the left sidebar of my blog.