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.
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| 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).
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| 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.
Those transitions -- changing thread and adjusting tension, unhooking the Q-Matic belts, putting the ruler base on and off the machine, hooking up Q-Matic again, resetting the safe area and realigning so the computer knows where it is again -- eat up a lot of time versus just doing all the computerized work in one thread color, then all the computer work in another color, then popping off the belts and putting on the ruler base to do all the ruler work, and so on. Next time I'll know better! |
| Bottom Border Quilted |
Here's another tip for Future Rebecca: I wish I'd done some marking for these borders before loading the quilt. Specifically, I should have marked the long side borders in quadrants and marked a chalk pencil line 1/4" in from the raw edges of the quilt top on all four sides. With an edge-to-edge design I quilt right off the edges of the quilt top, but when you're quilting a custom feather design like this one you want the feather plumes to all land INSIDE the edges that will be covered later by the quilt binding. Not having marked that ahead of time, I'm eyeballing it as I go along.
The sashing design I chose has also given me some stress because, although there is a separate design element for turning the corner, there wasn't an obvious way to connect the sashing design below the corner. What I really needed was a connector shaped like a T instead of a corner design shaped like an L. If I'd realized that before I began quilting, I could have modified the corner motif using editing tools in Art+Stitch digitizing software. My workaround (which is slowing me down) was to leave a small gap between the already stitched design from the row above and the next sashing I was beginning to stitch. After sewing out the digitized sashing design, I went back and drew a connection freehand with a chalk pencil. I quilted the "wiggle" like the bump in a free motion stippling design, but paused at the crest of the bump to slide my 1/2" ProPebble ruler around my hopping foot to help me get a nice, round circle that would blend in better with all the surrounding perfect circles that had been quilted by the computer.
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| Chalk Pencil and ProPebble Ruler to Free Motion Quilt Connections |
One more piece of advice for Future Rebecca: Computerized border designs are best for borders and sashing that are pretty straight and even in width. If the computer quilts a perfectly straight design on a border that wobbles, it draws attention to the fact that the border isn't straight. It's so much easier to compensate for that and camouflage those discrepancies when hand guided quilting, whether free motion or with rulers. Yes, you can fiddle around in the computer program to tweak and skew individual motifs down the length of the border to accommodate places where the border is a little wider, thinner, or crooked, but it takes HOURS AND HOURS and it's still imprecise because the quilt shifts and draws up during the stitching of the border and then the area you adjusted the design to fit is no longer in exactly the same place by the time the needle gets there. I vastly underestimated how many days I would spend quilting the borders and sashing on this quilt!
Meanwhile, back at the ranch...
My completed Deco quilt top is still spread out on the guest room bed. I oversized when I purchased my 108" wide backing yardage, the Anna Maria print below, but I prewashed it and I lost 6" in the width (this is typical especially with wide backings). I decided to lean into the bohemian vibe I was getting from my Anna Maria print so I dug around in my stash for some other loud prints in coordinating colors. I am piecing together a strip about 14" wide (I didn't measure first) and I'll insert that pieced strip kind of off-center through the width of my backing to get it the right size. This is very boring sewing and I lost interest quickly. Right now the backing-in-progress has been marinating on top of my cutting table for at least three days. It probably needs at least another day to ripen before I should finish it, don't you agree?
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| Enlarging Anna Maria Backing with Kaffe Fassett Scraps From My Stash |
Other exciting news in my sewing room? A furniture delivery! I ordered these chairs and foot stools from Natuzzi back in December and they were finally delivered last week. This end of the sunroom could have accommodated my long arm frame, but I decided to leave the long arm in its own workspace back in the "man cave" outbuilding at the back of our property. The sunroom is really the best room in our house and I wanted my husband to be able to enjoy it as well. I like being able to talk to him while I'm sewing or working at my computer, and it's easier to entice him into my sewing room to hang out with me now that he has a comfy chair to sit in.
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| New to the Sewing Palace: Reception Seating for Visitors! |
I've never had room for entertaining in my previous sewing rooms so this is really nice. Notice puppy wumpus contentedly chewing his bone -- he hangs out in this room, too, because he likes to look out the windows and supervise the wildlife. The other chair is for ME, and I'm looking forward to hand stitching appliqué and binding there.
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| Husband Checking Email |
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| Husband and Dog Relaxing |
The chair I'm not happy with in this room is the red Bernina sewing chair that I've had for years. The mechanism for the adjustable height is not holding anymore and when I sit down, the height sinks immediately and has to be lifted up again and again, and the seat cushioning has compressed and isn't as comfortable as it was when the chair was new. Instead of ordering another sewing chair, I went a different route. I ordered a black leather office task chair (like a desk chair but without arms) from Design Within Reach that should arrive sometime in May. I'm hoping it will be comfortable and longer-lasting than the sewing chairs I've had in the past, since I do spend a lot of time with my derriere parked in front of my sewing machine!
One last thought before I get back to the quilt on my frame: I had thought about prepping the 96 stuffed berries that I need for my FrankenWhiggish applique blocks during March Madness, but I procrastinated because once again, too much time had passed since touching this project and I wasn't sure where I left it or what my next steps were. I finally found the right blog post (screen shot below) indicating that I actually already made a start on these berries last August and I'm already farther along than I realized. Aaargh! I should be done with this already!
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| Internet Evidence of Where I Abandoned My Stuffed Berries... |
After reviewing that blog post, I screwed up the courage to get out the project bag and look inside...
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| All 96 Batting Circles Fused and Cut Out! |
You guys, this is like having elves come in the night. I was shocked to discover that I'd already traced off 96 circles onto my fusible web, fused it to the batting, and then cut out all 96 berry stuffings. I do not remember doing any of that! In my defense, I had to stop working on FrankenWhiggish to turn my attention to the Maria Shell improv workshop in September, and then my FIL's health torpedoed in September prior to his passing on October 1st, and everything from last Fall is really a blur. Anyway, I now see that my next step is to cut circles out of the floral print fabric, centering a flower on each one, and the first few will be experiments to figure out how much of a turning allowance I need to wrap around the batting stuffing. The batting circles get fused to the center of the fabric circle on the wrong side and from there it's just a running stitch around the Perfect Circles template, starch and press the edges, just like any other circle shape. So now at least I know that I need my iron for the next bit and won't be cutting with scissors at my kitchen table! Stay tuned...
Today is only Thursday but I don't remember whether I set any goals for this week on Tuesday. As of right now, I want to get Marybeth's quilt to the point where I can take it off the frame. I have a few edge to edge quilts to sneak in but then I'll be reloading Marybeth's quilt sideways so I can quilt those long side borders in a single pass. Not sure when I'll get to the Berries but hopefully sometime THIS MONTH! I've got travel at the end of the month, visiting my mom in Charlotte for her last choir concert before she moves to Austin, Texas, and it would be nice to have some hand stitching ready to go for those long travel days in Airport Purgatory. The end is in sight!
I'm linking up today's post with the following favorite linky parties:
MONDAY
Design Wall Monday at Small Quilts and Doll Quilts
Monday Musings at Songbird Designs
TUESDAY
To-Do Tuesday at Quilt Schmilt
WEDNESDAY
Wednesday Wait Loss at The Inquiring Quilter
THURSDAY
Needle and Thread Thursday at My Quilt Infatuation
FRIDAY
Finished or Not Friday at Alycia Quilts
Off the Wall Friday at Nina Marie Sayre
Beauty Pageant at From Bolt to Beauty
TGIFF Thank Goodness It’s Finished Friday, rotates, schedule found here: TGIF Friday
SUNDAY
Frédérique at Quilting Patchwork Appliqué
Oh Scrap! at Quilting Is More Fun Than Housework
6 comments:
New furniture is always fun
we looked at chairs something like that some time ago but I think the ones we looked at were lower to the floor and I said no as the age we are getting to I feel it is harder to get up out of a chair as we age - especially my husband who is overweight. I love the look of yours. On your quilting - I question from a hand quilter with a 3 roller - when I quilt after I roll the quilt tight and make sure all is smooth on the top and bottom I loosen it slightly so there is a little give which makes it easier to hand quilt - yours looks totally tight - you do not loosen it any I take it?
Those chairs look beautiful in the Sewing Palace! Your visitors look contented and comfortable. What a beautiful space!
Excellent question about tension for hand quilting versus for computerized long arm quilting, Karen! I know exactly what you mean because I took a hand quilting class with Dierdre McElroy (Roxanne's daughter of That Perfect Stitch and Roxanne's Glue Baste-It fame) years ago and while we were using lap hoops in class, she taught us how important it was to create that slack in the hoop so that our hand quilting needle could create that rocking stitch rotation and ensure that our stitches were going all the way through to the back of the quilt and coming out the same stitch length on the back of the quilt compared with the top.
That much slack for digital long arm quilting would be disastrous. You don't want to ratchet up the tension on the quilt sandwich as tight as possible like a drum, because that can cause problems like skipped stitches from needle flex (overly taut quilt sandwich creating resistance and bending the sewing machine needle away from the hook as the machine is zooming around stitching on the quilt). And you can definitely back off the frame tension on the quilt sandwich a little more with hand guided, free motion long arm quilting. But when I'm quilting a digital design of any kind, whether it's an edge-to-edge design like a clamshell or baptist fan pattern where each new row needs to align precisely with the last row quilted, or a block design that has to fit within the boundaries of the patchwork seams, my first step is to plot those crucial alignment points with the "sewhead" to tell the computer where I want it to stitch. If my quilt sandwich is too loose on my frame, the quilt sandwich and the alignment points will shift during stitching and the computerized design will not stitch out exactly where I needed it to go. That was a big lesson to wrap my brain around when I first got the long arm computer -- the computer is totally blind and relying on where I program it to stitch. The computer can't see the quilt at all. When you're quilting free motion, on a long arm or a domestic machine, or hand quilting, you are relying on your vision throughout the stitching process to follow marked lines or to quilt an unmarked design in a particular space. When the seams or marked lines move in front of you, you adjust automatically without even thinking about it. With the computer quilting, it would be like if you sat down at your hand quilting frame, looked at the quilt with the design marked in front of you and "memorized" where you're supposed to stitch, and then your husband put a bag over your head and told you to start quilting. ;-). Even if you perfectly remembered the design and where the stitches were supposed to go on the quilt, if the quilt sandwich moved at all while you were stitching the design would come out all messed up!
I love your progress on the 1984 Sampler! The new furniture is beautiful and I hope the new office chair is just the ticket!!! As for the backing. . .just do it. . .it isn't going to ripen any more than it has already!!!LOL
Ooo those new chairs look comfy!
Ugh sewing chairs...a problem almost as difficult to find a good fit as it is lighting or sewing cabinets! If you like the chair in fully raised position, you might try to fix it by raising the seat, then removing the lever from the base. I had a chair I fixed that way. Apparently over time somehow when I sat in the chair, there was enough flex in the seat to press on the lever?? If it werent' for the cushioning going out too, I'd suggest check if replacement cylinders are available. I just got one for my Arrow chair that's finally failed after 10-12 years of service. I hope to get it installed today.
Oh my - so much to consider when using a long arm!! I'm glad I've resisted the temptations. Videos make it look SO easy, but I know better. My "brainless" sit-down machine is enough thinking for me. No programming, not even stitch regulation. Picking thread, getting the tension set, and deciding on a quilting pattern is enough challenge :-)
Awesome cool beans on finding all those little berries so far along!
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