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!

Custom Quilting Progress on the 1984 Sampler Quilt

Good morning and Happy Thursday!  I've been making progress with the custom quilting on my friend's circa 1984 sampler quilt.  There are certain editing tools and features in Q-Matic (the computer robotics package that enables me to quilt digitally with my Bernina Q24 long arm machine) that don't get used in edge-to-edge quilting, and I'm learning more about how to use them to size and skew digital quilting designs to fit inside the imperfect shapes of patchwork pieced by humans.  My friend Marybeth is being extremely patient; I think I've had this quilt in my possession for six months at least, and most of that time I've been procrastinating and agonizing and catastrophizing about all of the ways I might mess it up...  But I'm feeling better about it now and I think it's going to look pretty good when it comes off the frame and I can see it as a whole instead of zooming in on every little imperfection.

Digital Block Design with Digital Sashing Design

I'm trying to balance out the different types of quilting throughout the quilt.  I think I have maybe three blocks like the one above where I've stitched one digital design across the entire block.  That can be quite lovely when it's a good pairing between the quilting design and the patchwork.  I did stitch in the ditch quilting in the patchwork seams prior to stitching the block design but some quilters would choose to just do the block design to save time (and to save money, if someone was paying for the custom quilting).

P2P Triangle Design with Separate Digital Motif in Block Center

In the block above, I quilted a P2P (Point to Point) digital design one at a time in each of the red print triangles.  Then I quilted a separate digital design in the center of the block.  I'll go back later and quilt the red and blue solid patches, probably straight line quilting with rulers.  I'm learning (belatedly!) that it's more efficient to do all of one type of quilting throughout the quilt before moving on to a different type of quilting.  When I started working on this quilt I knew enough to do all of my basting and SID (Stitch In the Ditch quilting along all the seam lines) throughout the entire quilt before rolling back up to the top of the quilt to start on the fun quilting that actually shows, but then I tried to quilt one row completely (digital designs, ruler work, free motion quilting, multiple thread color changes etc) before moving on to the next row.  

Say My Name: "In War Time, 1863," by Jane A. Stickle

Good morning, Quilty Peeps!  Today's post is another in a series exploring and organizing my thoughts around the many quilts I hope to make "Someday," in order to deter myself from wasting time chasing the so-called Squirrel Projects that sometimes distract me.  The idea is that, before I purchase a new pattern or project materials, I'll consult my new Future Quilt Plans page at the top of my blog and decide whether I really want to invest the time in that new distraction project, or whether I really would be happier digging into one of my Bucket List quilts instead.  It has recently dawned on me that I probably won't live long enough to make every single quilt that strikes my fancy, so I want to be more intentional about which quilts I admire from a distance and which ones I choose to make for myself.

"In War Time, 1863" by Jane A. Stickle

"In War Time, 1863" 80.25 x 80.25 Original Antique Quilt by Jane A. Stickle

So much has been written about this iconic quilt.  You can see it in person at the Bennington Museum in Bennington, Vermont (check first before traveling as it's not always on display) and the best history of the quilt maker Jane A. Stickle can be found in the Summer 2013 issue of the Walloomsack Review on the museum's website here.  I know some of you have already made one or more versions of this quilt and others of you have it on your own Wanna-Make lists, but you're likely calling the original antique quilt by a different name.

Jane A. Stickle Named Her Quilt "In War Time, 1863."  NOT "Dear Jane"

One of the many remarkable things about Stickle's quilt is that, very unusually for the period, her quilt includes a label that names her quilt "In War Time, 1863" as well as the number of pieces in the quilt (5,602) and her name, Jane A. Stickle.  The "Dear Jane Quilt" moniker derives from a 1996 book by Brenda Manges Papadakis in which the author extols the virtues of the Stickle quilt and presents self-drafted line drawing reproductions of the blocks interspersed with extensive imaginary correspondence with the quilt maker.  Papadakis was so smitten with the Stickle quilt that she was inspired to learn everything she could about the quilt maker, the world she inhabited, and what was happening around her during the time she made the quilt.  However, Jane Stickle was an ordinary woman of declining fortunes living in times when ordinary women's lives tended to go undocumented.  We know she was childless, we know she was married but living apart from her husband at one point in their marriage when the census listed him as living with some other, much younger wife.  Later censuses show Jane living with her husband again, filing for bankruptcy, and ending her life as a ward of the state.  "In War Time, 1863" was a project she devised to pass time when she was bedridden.  

Papadakis' book Dear Jane: The Two Hundred Twenty-Five Patterns from the 1863 Jane A. Stickle Quilt  and the many classes she taught have been instrumental in sharing Stickle's exquisite masterpiece with hundreds of thousands of quilters worldwide, both challenging and encouraging readers to attempt reproductions and variations based on the original.  If Papadakis had not written about and popularized this quilt, I probably wouldn't even know it existed.  And, to her credit, Papadakis herself refers to Jane's quilt reverentially as "The Quilt" and only nicknames her students and their quilts as "Baby Janes."  The quilt only became known as "The Dear Jane Quilt" colloquially subsequent to the publication of the Papadakis book as quilters around the world fell in love with the quilt and began the journey of making “Dear Jane” quilts themselves.  

Which is all well and good, except what would that look like if Jane Sickle had been a male artist, working in a highly esteemed medium like oil painting rather than the oft-denigrated “women’s work” of needle craft?

The Dear Leonardo Portrait

The "Dear Leonardo" Portrait (instead of Mona Lisa or La Giaconda) by Leonardo Da Vinci?

My beloved Leonardo,

         I dreamed of you with longing today whilst working on my replica of The Portrait.  Who was this woman you painted, and what did she mean to you?  She must have sat in your presence for hours on end as you painted, close enough to breathe the same air, staring directly into your smoldering eyes and inhaling the intoxicating scent of your manhood.  Was she your mother, as some have supposed, the wife of your father's merchant friend Giaconda, or your own secret paramour, smirking at you playfully?  Perhaps she tried to keep a straight face as was customary in portraits of the time, but your ribald stories and dirty jokes broke down her maidenly reserve.  You lived through such an amazing time, what with the Renaissance and the Medici family's campaign to Make Florence Great Again...  Oh Leonardo, if only we were not separated by the centuries, I know you and I would be lovers as I am truly your soul mate now that I am copying your painting and thereby gaining access to your very soul!  I long to lick your paint brushes clean and will never stop searching for more of your precious paintings.

                                                     Your Playmate,

                                                      Rebecca Grace

Now seriously -- Isn't that WEIRD when it’s me writing letters to Leonardo Da Vinci instead of Brenda Papadakis writing letters to Jane Sickle?  Writing to "My beloved Jane" and signing off "your playmate Brenda" comes straight out of the Papadakis book.   (There are no sexual overtones in Papadakis’ letters to Jane, however.  I got carried away with my letter to Leonardo…)