I
like to self-identify as a fabric artist rather than a quilter. Which gets a lot of puzzled smiles, quietly raised
eyebrows, and a question: “What’s the difference between a fabric
artist and a quilter?”
After
all, a traditional quilter creates…a quilt.
A fabric artist creates…a quilt.
The differences may seem small, but they’re there, trust me.
The difference is in intent and outcome.
Ever dangle your legs over a stream? Then let’s do it on fabric!
Do
you want to create a quilt that is beautifully sewn, has all its points
matching perfectly and wins a blue ribbon at the local quilt show?
Or
do you want to tell a unique story that shows passion, humor, and beauty?
Fabric art isn’t so much about traditionalism and winning blue ribbons at fairs. Although as Isaac Newton famously said, “If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.”
We
like to embrace the traditional beauty and influences, but build on it.
So, if you intend to create a story, you may use traditional techniques – but achieve an entirely different outcome.
Defining Fabric Art by Creating
Movement
The fabric art that we create is mostly movement and accessories. I spoke about the accessory angle in my Bling Blog, and I touched on creating movement in my Backgrounds First blog but I want to go into it in more depth here.
Just to clarify; when we say we’re creating movement, we don’t mean physical movement.
What we’re referring to is any aspect of a quilt that draws your eye from one section to another. I, for one, much prefer to view a project that tells a story and pulls you in, inviting you to become a part of the conversation, rather than a beautifully crafted, point-perfect masterpiece.
Here we have two moving elements; water, which always moves, and the butterflies. There’s a suggestion of potential movement from the frog – but that creates tension rather than movement.
You
may sense a little bitterness here towards what I like to refer to as the ‘Quilt
Nazis.’ If you’ve gone to a quilt store
of fair where everything runs on rules, you know what I mean.
Or
maybe it’s even a little bit of quilter’s envy, since many great traditionalist
quilters achieve levels of mastery that I can only envy.
But
what it really is, is a superior attitude on my part. I, like many human beings, like looking down
at the poor quilting robots trapped in their “this-is-the-pattern-and-I-have-to-follow-it-religiously”
rut.
Genesis of My Quilting Rebellion
It
started for me way back in the day when I made my kids’ first baby quilts.
I’ve got a real low boredom threshold. So rather than just make a quilt with blocks of the same Scotty dogs or bunny rabbits, I decided that I had to enliven things. I did this by adding variety:
Different fabrics for each block
Colored ribbons
Yarn embellishments
Different colored threads
And squishy bunny tails
These were a great hit with my babies, so when they were ready for regular beds, I made them each a twin quilt.
Instead of sewing a basic Sunbonnet Sue or Suspender Sam quilt, I went to Walmart. And there I found all the little girl/boy appliques they had and added one to each block.
Each
block of these early quilts featured a quaint little cutout engaged in a
different activity.
A
Sunbonnet Sue may be seen picking flowers or flying balloons, and in my son’s
quilt a Suspender Sam could be driving tractors or playing with a dog. I knew this was the way to go when I
overheard Suzanna telling her siblings a story about what was happening in the
quilt.
After that I explored the whole crazy quilt genre which I liked exceedingly because of all the different fabrics and colors and varying angles they’re sewn at.
When
everyone I knew or was related to – and their dog – had a quilt from me, I
started looking around for something different to create and gradually ended up
where I am now. Just let me say that the
fabric art I create and sew is not that technically difficult.
What
it can be, however, is extremely creative and often time consuming.
To
the way my mind works though, it’s a perfect fit. And for a project to “fit”
for me it has to move and say something.
Here is how I go about creating movement and stories in my fabric art.
Critical Questions to Ask Before Creating Movement in Fabric Art
Is my character
moving or is it the background?
I
have discovered that it is both too difficult and too time consuming to try to
accomplish both in the same panel. Plus
its way too complicated and actually accomplishes the opposite of drawing a
viewer in.
Do
one or the other, but not both.
In my ‘Christmas Delivery’ panel the unicorn is standing still; it’s the fairies that are moving. In my ‘Coral Reef Panel’ the fish are moving so much that you don’t really notice the water.
As
an aside, water, air, and fire are background elements that break the general
rule. In Coral Reef the water’s moving,
but it’s so subtle that your mind sees it and dismisses it because what’s going
on in the foreground is just so interesting.
Once
you’ve got your what, it’s time to move on to creating movement with non-moving
materials.
What materials
will accomplish movement?
Execution
matters.
If
it’s your background that will be moving, you have 3 options – fabric, thread
and accessories.
If it’s the character that’s moving you have the same 3 options, but to these you can also add batting, foam, appliques, and specialized quilting techniques.
We’ll
talk about these elements next week in the middle installment of this article
series.
Hey,
it’s movement. And creating movement is
the very basis of fabric art – it can’t be talked about in just a few short
lines. OK, a few long lines, but
still! That’s why we’re here.
In the meantime, please sign up for our FREE newsletter. We’ve got some very exciting developments coming up in the next few months, and we can’t wait to share each update with you personally.
Just
like a lady getting ready for a date, accessories really help amp an already
beautiful quilt into the realm of fabric art.
When a woman wants to feel really beautiful and confident and draw
attention to herself, out comes all the beauty accouterments from makeup to
jewelry.
And it works!!! Of course it does or we wouldn’t bother.
Elevate a project from ordinary to extraordinary with a few easy bling tricks
It’s
also really helpful if the woman underneath the bling has a beautiful soul as
well, because then the bling enhances her true beauty rather than working to
disguise what’s missing.
This
is the same principle we use when we decide how to accessorize our fabric art
projects. In order for bling to work in
fabric art the real beauty should already exist in the quilt itself. You achieve this by:
Choosing the best quality
fabric you can afford
Paying close
attention to colors, thread, patterns, stitching, etc.
Using the best
possible quilting techniques
Loving your
project (it really does show, even though there’s no way to pin this quality
down with a how-to!)
Once
all of that is in place and done, then you can start having some real fun with
all the bling. Here are some of the
things I use quite regularly to help my fabric art POP.
Appliques
Appliques are either shaped pieces of fabric or machine embroidered shapes that can be sewn over the front of any fabric from clothes to potholders to quilts. Appliques are by far the easiest and fastest way to add interest to any beautiful quilt project.
You
can buy the embroidery patch appliques – especially for kids and babies – at
any arts and crafts store, or Walmart, and they’re really cute and
adorable.
Years ago, when my son was a little boy I made a Suspender Sam quilt for him and in each square I put in a store-bought little boy applique. It was absolutely adorable and Aram wore that quilt out over years of little-boy hard-loving.
Or,
you can make your own.
This
technique is slightly more involved and advanced than store-bought appliques,
but it gives you a much greater range of options. I’ve come a long way since the Suspender Sam
quilt, and now I make most of my own appliques.
To
do this simply pick an element that you want to applique, like birds, soft-fuse
them, fussy cut them and then stitch onto your project.
Fussy cutting is nothing more than cutting out the shape you want to applique. I give a detailed list of instructions on how to do this in my “How to Applique Fabric Art Quilts with Confidence” blog.
My
2 best examples of this are my Tropical Reef panel, in which I used almost 200
appliques – I might have gone a little bit crazy there – and my Dragon quilt.
HINT: Make sure you have really sharp scissors,
especially little ones that are sharp at the tips. This really helps to get those little tiny
shapes like noses and fingers sharply cut.
Fabric Flowers
Many
people think of fake flower bouquets as tacky and so did I for many years. Then they started making them out of silk,
and what a tremendous innovation that was.
Just not for setting up as a bouquet, because the leaves get
super-dusty, and then you’re back to tacky.
Where I love to use silk flowers and leaves is on my landscape wall hangings and beautiful quilts.
Not
only are they soft and easily sewn, they are incredibly life-like, and I
figure, why go to all the trouble of cutting out tiny little pieces of fabric
and appliqueing them, when you can just applique a silk flower?
Of
course, I soft-fuse all of my flowers and leaves first because sewing one of
these without it will just cause it to tear and fray.
This
is one of the articles I’ll get to eventually, but for now here’s the bird’s
eye how-to on fabric flowers and leaves.
First,
strip all the stems and veins off of your silk flowers and leaves. These are made of plastic and don’t work on
fabric. Just pull gently but firmly, and
the stems and veins usually strip away just fine. Plus, it takes a lot less room to store these
than if you left them the way they come from the store.
Next
cut out a piece of soft-fuse approximately 12 inches square. This is a workable size.
Now
lay it paper side down on your ironing board and then lay your flowers and
leaves on the rough, upper side. Lay
these down right-side-up and as close together as possible without overlapping
them.
Finally
place a piece of wax paper over all and press with a hot iron.
Hold
the iron down approximately 30 seconds longer than you would on regular fabric
so that the heat can penetrate all the way through the thicker leaves.
Wait till completely cool and then peel off the wax paper and the paper backing. Do this carefully so the soft-fuse will not lift away from the leaves – it usually doesn’t but now and then….
Use
a sharp-tipped scissor to trim any Soft-fuse excess from between petals, etc.
and then position your flowers and leaves on your project right-side-up and
press.
I
mostly stitch these down with a narrow blanket stitch and voila – a beautiful,
life-like applique! Silk flowers are
fairly cheap and affordable, and are available in a wide variety of
stores.
Trims
By
trims I mean ribbons, lace, rickrack, braids, ropes, etc. Basically anything that comes wrapped around
a little cardboard spool.
Your
options here are almost endless and there’s always something new.
Don’t
forget to check out the DIY wedding decoration aisles at arts and crafts stores
like Hobby Lobby and Michaels – they have tons of stuff as well.
I’ve used things that weren’t really meant to go with fabric, like raffia string, faux paper grass, and feathers as trims as well – just be careful because you’ll never be able to wash the finished quilt.
A
word of caution here – you can overdo trims.
Trims
should be used to enhance certain design features and to draw the eye to things
you want noticed on your already beautiful quilt. This is especially true of the bling trims –
the shiny sparkly ones.
Don’t
over-use these. If you look at my Coral
Reef panel, you’ll see that I put on almost 200 appliques but I only used the
bling trim in 4 places.
That’s
because bling trim can become overwhelming.
I also used bright multi-colored thread-like trim as sea grass in 2
places, which really helps to give the illusion of the sea but you don’t really
notice it at first because it’s not shiny.
So by all means BLING, but with discretion.
A beautiful – if basic – concept
Add some ribbon and a delicate touch of matching bling
And this beautiful quilt is complete in romantic miniature
Trims
are also great for covering up mistakes or stuff that just doesn’t look the way
you thought it would.
It’s
the seamstress’s version of sweeping something under the rug and you should not
be surprised by how often I do this. A
great way to use sparkly trims is to wait until the end of the project, as
you’ll then know what needs to be hidden.
Buttons & Beads
I LOVE these!!! They come in almost every color and shape imaginable, are relatively cheap and can be made to be almost anything you want.
Common
ways to use buttons and beads to enhance landscapes panels and beautiful quilts
include:
Buttons make
perfect centers for fabric flowers (since
once you remove the plastic supports these flowers just have a little hole in
the middle.)
Buttons can
represent the sun
Depending upon
their shape beads can be
Rocks
Shells
Trees
Windows
Cobbled streets
Etc.
Just
anything your imagination can concoct!
Buttons
are usually more expensive because they are sold by the card, or little
packages with 6-8 buttons for the cheaper ones.
Beads now – I have found large packages of them at Hobby Lobby that are very cost effective and in any combination you like. Beads also often come in themed packages – amber and red, blue and turquoise, shells and pearls, etc. This is my favorite way to quickly fill up some gaps on a mid-to-large sized project.
NOTE: Buttons and beads need to be sewn down very
tightly to stand up to the years they’ll be expected to do duty on your amazing
fabric art project.
To
make sure a button or bead will stay sewn on, use double thread in your
needle. Then sew through at least 5
times to make sure it’s tight.
A
little trick here – before you go down the last time, slide your needle between
your button/bead and your fabric and wrap your thread around the existing
thread about 3 times (tightly) and then go down to the back of your fabric.
Tie
off by threading your needle through a loop of your thread twice instead of
just once to make your knot and do this twice so that your knot will never come
undone.
If
my button is quite heavy or bulky I also use fabric glue behind the button and
also put a dab on the knot at the back.
It dries clear and invisible and really reassures that that bling won’t
come off.
This
is especially important if you have small children around. Kids will pull on lumpy, shiny things, and if
they get them loose, they’ll put them in their mouths.
Other Stuff
These
are things that don’t fit in any category…because they’re not actually made to
be sewn onto fabric – but I do it anyway.
For
example, as I was perusing the DIY wedding aisles at Hobby Lobby, I came across
these silver leaves that are meant to be used in bouquets. They’re not solid – just the outside shape
and veins with some curlicues here and there, all in silver and in different
sizes.
I stood there and looked at them for a while because I was very drawn to them, and eventually they talked to me and told me they wanted to be used as fairy wings. So they will be!
Into the “other stuff” category you could also place jingle bells, feathers, decorations for any holiday and reclaimed jewelry or hardware.
I used the glass flower off of one of Suzanna’s old hair tighties as the center of my shamrock table topper, and I’m using a belt buckle as a tie for my silver rope on my mermaid quilt (coming soon).
So just look around and keep your imagination wide open.
Thread
You
might not think of thread as an accessory or a bling-up aid.
The truth is, however, thread and how you apply it, can make a HUGE difference to the finished look of your project. There are hundreds of colors out there for you to choose from and many different types.
If these colors aren’t blinged-up accessories, then I don’t know what is!
The ones I use most often for bling are the metallics, variegated, crochet and embroidery threads.
Once
again, take a look at your project and see if there’s any element that can be
enhanced or brought out by thread. You
can make it quite heavy as in a satin stitch, or barely there.
In
my mermaid quilt, I’m using a variegated metallic thread to sew in waves, but
only in a single line of straight stitching.
The sparkly edges on my “waves” won’t jump out at you, but they’ll be
there, gently adding sparkle and movement.
I’ve just purchased a pack of glow-in-the-dark thread and am trying to think of a project where they could really shine – pun intended.
And
don’t forget yarns. They come in a
plethora of colors – even variegated and can be used almost anywhere. You can’t sew most through your machine, but
you can stitch them down with a zigzag like some kind of super-skinny trim.
Chiffons
Here
comes the bride…
Chiffons,
are those see through, very fine netting material you can find in most fabric
stores. They come in all colors, many
different shades of the same color, and many of them have sparkles and designs
on them.
They can also be called organza fabric, and some are just netting – most chiffon and organza is opaque with no actual holes.
Chiffons
are most often used for fancy dresses like prom, wedding, and evening dresses,
but they make nifty highlights for your projects.
I
most often use them when I want something to appear mystically magical, or to
blur images.
I used pink
sparkle chiffon on my main mermaid’s tail, and it made that beautiful design
into magic.
I’m planning on
using different colored chiffons on all the rest of the mermaids on the quilt
as well.
I used a clear
sparkle chiffon to cover my Christmas stars.
You
don’t need a lot of chiffon to pack a pretty gentle punch. Also, Suzanna has a fabric flower-making kit
(Kanzashi) and we use those forms to make chiffon flowers that we add to our
projects as well.
Lights
I
have personally never used lights on a project before but, like me, you have
probably seen those Christmas kits that include lights.
I
really like the look so Suzanna and I spent quite a bit of time on the Internet
looking for them, but could find none anywhere.
We eventually purchased a set of 6 different colored strings of fairy
lights that I want to use in a number of different projects.
Since
I was having a hard time figuring out how to attach them to my projects, I took
my projects and the lights to our local quilt store and asked the ladies for
their ideas – and I got them!
I
haven’t done it yet, though, so I have no steps or tips. Watch for upcoming articles, hopefully.
Bling it Up – Create More Beautiful
Quilts
In conclusion, don’t be afraid to use unorthodox objects for your projects as well as the “normal” things you can find in the fabric section.
Most times it’ll be a combination of tradition and radical, normality and uniqueness, that creates a finished effect that dazzles and reflects some type of realism. Better to create a beautiful quilt that shines too much than a quilt that doesn’t shine at all.
Don’t be afraid to experiment, and definitely don’t be afraid to try new things.
You may have a few wrecks along the way, but that’s half the fun – and you can always submit the tales of wow and disaster to our Seam Ripper Championships.
Quilt
batting is one of those things that are invisible when a project is finished
and so it’s human nature to deem it of less importance than the front of the
project. Just like quilt backing,
another so-called “secondary” concern which is actually very important.
We often ask the wrong question, “Why bother spending time on something no one sees?”
Instead of asking, “I want my quilt to be the best it can be, and so I need to know how to use quilt batting to its best effect in my work of art.”
Your quilt sandwich – neat & clean
However,
quilt batting matters greatly because it’s that foundation thing again – if you
don’t get your foundation right the whole thing goes to rack and ruin very
quickly. Quilt backings and battings are
MAJOR
foundations, so you need to consider your batting choices. And there are a lot of choices out there!
Like
everything else in quilting there is no one right answer because quilting is an
artistic endeavor and not an exact science – which is very lucky for me since I
had no luck with the sciences in school.
How to Make the Best Product Choice
when Selecting Quilt Batting
What kind of batting you decide to use in your project depends on the purpose of your project. Here are the purposes I consider. Do you want your finished quilt to be:
Nicely functional
A showpiece
A competition entry
Decorative or shaped piece
A gift
An heirloom
Like everything else in the quilting universe, the choices in battings has expanded exponentially (this is a very big word that I like to use whenever I can to make myself look smart). So let’s have a look at each type and what they can and cannot do.
NOTE:
Here’s a trick that comes in real
handy when your project is a bit catawampus or your quilt top doesn’t want to
lay flat no matter how much you starch and iron it. To correct this, use 2 layers of batting in
your project – I recommend cotton since its lighter. The extra batting helps to take up the extra
slack in your quilt top and lays it down flat.
100% man-made polyester quilt
batting
There’s nothing ‘natural’ about this option. And to be honest polyester batting has a lot of problems and it’s not my favorite. Which isn’t to say it doesn’t have its proper place in the spectrum of artistic options.
Polyester batting is used only behind the really puffy fish, making them stand out from the flatter cotton quilt batting used for the whole panel.
We used polyester batting, carefully cut away from sections of the lilies, to create this incredibly subtle 3D effect
Pros:
It’s very light – actually the lightest batting available
Very cost-effective. If cost is an issue for you, then this is the cheapest way to proceed.
I find this batting a good choice for children’s soft cuddle toys, poufy baby quilts, etc. I keep some on hand to use for ‘Trapunto’ – which is when you put batting behind an applique to make it ‘pop out’ from the rest of the design.
This batting is also ideal for baby and young children’s quilts because it is so light-weight and yet warm. You don’t have to load your precious little one down with heavy quilts to keep them warm.
Cons:
Polyester batting can be pulled apart quite easily
which means that it has to be quilted much more tightly than other battings so
it won’t pull apart inside your quilt and make lumps. This takes more thread and time.
For want of a better word, polyester batting is fluffy
and poofy, even the low-loft stuff which is much flatter than the high-loft
batting. This makes it harder to quilt
and also makes keeping your quilt surface flat a considerable challenge.
100% Natural Cotton Batting
If the thought of manufactured goods bothered you, and you prefer to keep a connection to natural ingredients than this is probably the most natural choice for you. Most cotton battings are now 100% natural.
This panel used different layers of different types of batting to create the puffy, full effect
A single layer of thin cotton batting helps keep the focus on this silhouette
I
really, really like cotton battings and use them in most of my quilting
projects. In my opinion there aren’t
that many cons to using cotton, or mostly cotton, battings. Here’s why…
Pros:
Cotton battings are thin, lay flat, can be easily
ironed and are mid-weight which makes them a superior choice for quilts that
will be used on beds.
They are also warm for being so thin. If you have never constructed a full size
quilt, you will be amazed at how heavy they can get when all 3 layers are sewn
together. The front, batting and backing
are not heavy by themselves, yet quilt them together and boy howdy, that sucker
gets heavy real fast! This is an
important consideration if you’re planning a king or queen quilt and plan on
quilting it yourself – the thicker your batting, the heavier the quilt gets – exponentially.
These battings are much harder to pull apart manually
and will not come apart with repeated washing.
Therefore, the quilting does not have to be that dense to keep it in
place. Most of these battings can be quilted
8” – 10” apart, which cuts down on the amount of thread you use and also the
time it takes to quilt your project.
Because they are lightweight, they work very well for
panels that will be displayed on walls because there is very little drag.
If perchance, your batting piece is not large enough
for your project, it is simplicity itself to sew 2 or more pieces
together. Just lay the pieces side by
side and sew them together with beige thread and a zig-zag stitch. I have seen special joining tape that can be
purchased for this purpose, but it’s not necessary.
Cotton batting will lay flat and straight if you sew
the seams with a tight enough stitch.
Cons:
Cotton quilt batting is more expensive
Cotton doesn’t have that “cuddly” feeling – so by itself it may not be the best choice for a child’s quilt or a comfort lap quilt.
Cotton can get too warm really fast. Sometimes a quilt tends to be wonky and have pleats and bubbles. One of the best ways to get around this is to use a double layer of batting to stretch the quilt top – but a double layer of cotton batting can be much too suffocating for a summer quilt.
Another Natural Batting is 100% Wool Batting
I’m
not a huge fan of wool quilt batting, but it does exist, and it is,
occasionally, a good choice for a great quilt. Since I seldom use it, you may want to take
my advice on it with just a little grain of salt.
Pros:
The main usage for wool batting in my world is when I really want to define some aspect of the quilting.
This is what cotton batting looks like, flat and neatly trimmed. I don’t use wool enough to have pics of the effects
Because
wool batting is approximately twice as thick as cotton, the quilting lines go
in much deeper than with cotton batting.
This causes the un-quilted portion of your project to pop up and appear
much closer than it is. In effect, it
causes a 3-D illusion. I used this
technique in my Night Guardian panel.
The night sky portion of that panel was quilted with wool batting and
therefore appears much closer than it actually is. I also used this same quilting on the
background of my dragon panel to help the dragon itself pop off of the panel.
Wool
batting, however, does have its good points.
One of these is that, like cotton, it is natural so that there is less
worry about allergy and health issues.
Wool
quilt batting’s also densely constructed, so the quilting doesn’t have to be
that heavy.
Also,
washing is not a problem – it goes through washers and dryers without pilling,
pulling apart, or shrinking.
Cons:
Wool
batting, by its very nature is WARM.
Very warm. Unless you live in an
unheated house, or Antarctica, you may want to re-think using a wool batting in
your quilts. They are HOT!
Wool
batting is also very heavy. For these
reasons I don’t use it in quilts, especially NOT anything larger than a lap
quilt. Remember that once you layer all
3 entities of a quilt sandwich together, a quilt gets heavy very fast. If you use wool batting, the weight will
become almost unmanageable. I had to
have help pulling a quilt sandwich through my machine, and that was just the
middle panel of my dragon quilt.
Imagine, if you will, the weight of a full-sized quilt!
These
are the 3 main types of batting available in quilt stores. The come in different weights, thicknesses,
and percentages. The choices seem
overwhelming when you look at the shelves and shelves of batting choices.
But my number one recommendation is:
Warm’N’Natural Mostly Cotton
Batting
This
stuff is amazing. Its 80% cotton, and
20% some man-made fiber I can’t really pronounce. It combines the best of both worlds, and is
warm but much lighter than any other option.
You can double-down on it without causing your house to sink into its foundation, and you can also use it in combination with wool or polyester quilt battings when you’re going for poufy applique techniques.
You’ll find warm’n’natural quilt batting in most of my quilts and wall hangings from the last ten years, and I’ll stand by its use in 97% of quilting situations.
It’s also fairly well-priced on one of our favorite money-saving sites, Fabric.com. Here you can get a King-sized package and – unless you’re making a king-sized quilt – it’ll last at least a couple of months.
My
final recommendation is to use warm’n’natural mostly – but if you want or need
to use a different quilt batting for some reason, here’s Princess YellowBelly
Design’s final word.
Match-Up of Desired Finish to Functionality
Most quilt battings can be layered
Foam works great with batting
And you can achieve this effect – easy, beautiful, and in-depth
Functionality
– Cotton batting either 100% natural or a blend – it really doesn’t matter.
Showpiece –
If it’s small enough and you really want to create a 3-D effect use 100% wool
batting. If it’s larger use cotton. Sometimes, I’ll use 2 layers of cotton
batting so that I get the 3-D effect without the weight.
Competition
– If you’re entering your work to be judged, then use the best batting you can
afford and get it professionally quilted.
Weight doesn’t matter so much in this instance, but quality does.
Decorative
– Use cotton batting and quilt thoroughly – you don’t want it to lose its
shaped and definition while it’s hanging.
Gifts
– Depends on size and function but use the best batting you can afford so that
the gift will endure.
Heirlooms
– This is where quality is the most obvious.
If you are planning for your projects to be passed down to future
generations, you have to use the best quality materials available and this
includes your batting. I would recommend
warm’n’natural, of course, but if not then you should go for 100% cotton at the
highest quality available.
Purchasing Batting
Like
everything else you need to consider your needs and shop around.
Packaged
quilt batting comes in specific sizes – twin, queen, king, etc. If you are only going to be sewing one
project then buying a pre-packaged size is the cheapest way to go. There will be little waste.
Also,
if you’re purchasing online, then this is the cheapest option to ship.
However,
if, like me, you sew constantly, and – unlike me you live close to a JoAnn’s
Fabric store – then I would recommend buying your batting by the yard from
rolls. And when I say yard it’s not a
45” wide yard like it is for fabric, but a 90” yard.
Especially if you have a bulk coupon it’s much, much cheaper this way too, and art stores carry a lot of different brands to boot.
When all of your materials work together right…you have created art!
A Final Note of Caution
I
have seen packaged batting that is made from 100% recyclable materials.
Now,
I like recycling and saving the environment as much as the next quilter, but I
can’t help it…I’m EXTREMELY leery of these.
My
thinking is this…whatever they were recycled from you can bet it was chemically
constructed, manmade, and unnatural.
Then they recycle it with more chemicals and reconstruct it with even
more processing and chemicals.
This is certainly not something I want to put close to my face in a bed quilt – especially for babies or young children – or in a heirloom quilt will it start to break down after 10-20 years? I would urge caution if you want to go in this direction and start with something small.
In
the world of carpentry, a fixer-upper would be a house that needs fixing. However, in the world of fabric art,
fixer-uppers are the things we use to make the fixes. When you need to undo a major mistake – also
known as boo-boos – or get to places where a sewing machine cannot, these three
little things are how to fix quilting mistakes.
I
would strongly suggest that you have these things in your sewing kits, as a
true fabric artist cannot do without them.
These three little helpers can turn a so-so project into a WOW project and a, “how did they do that?” project, because they make mistakes either inconsequential or completely invisible.
Curling leaves, missed stitches, and contrasting colors are all potential mistakes – but you can’t see any of them here
#1 How to Fix Quilting Mistakes
Using Fabric Glue
This
stuff is absolutely invaluable and completely necessary in fabric art, because
not only are you not infallible, neither is your sewing machine.
Accidents
happen; accept this, stop beating yourself up over them, and learn how to fix quilting
mistakes.
Fabric
glue is your #1 fixer-upper. I’ve
noticed that some fabrics have a much higher fray rate than others, and if you
stitch them too close to the edge, or if your stitch length is just a tiny bit
too loose for that particular fabric, it will fray right through the seam.
The
heck of it is that it doesn’t happen right away. It waits until you’ve sewn down all around it
and it’s almost impossible to get that exact spot back under your machine.
Now what?
There are dozens of different accessories that need to be held fast with fabric glue.
I
had a ton of this type of trouble with my dragon quilt. I was sashing with black Kona fabric and even
though I checked every seam as I finished it and everything, every time I
turned around, there was another place that had let go.
I
was using a few creative curses by the time I finished! But fabric glue was my salvation here.
This
is tedious work, so Leiajoy does most of my gluing for me, and she likes to use
a toothpick to maneuver the drops of glue around until she has it exactly where
she wants it.
This
fabric glue takes approximately 24 hours to dry and then it’s fixed.
I also use the glue as an extra hold for buttons, beads, etc. that I have sewn onto my creations because it is extra insurance that these items will never come loose. On the backs of projects I use a drop on the thread knots from sewing down these same buttons and beads to insure no coming loose.
I
also use it on the back if I have gone too fast during some of my free-motion
quilting and the bobbin thread got too loose and isn’t holding tight enough..
Rather
than ripping it out and trying to maneuver the entire project back under my
machine I just glue it and was-la! It
will never come loose!
My
advice is to get some of this amazing stuff and use it!
#2 How to Fix Quilting Mistakes
Using Permanent Fabric Markers
This
is not a specialty quilt store pen – these are those packs of bright Sharpie
markers that you see every year in kids’ back-to-school supplies.
These babies can become your best friends if you’ll let them.
They are the perfect solution for creating realistic illusions, finishing off things too tiny to sew, and marking out mistakes.
You can get these anywhere – I bought a 24 color set from Walmart. I also got a few gold and silver sparkly ones as well because I use so much bling.
However,
for fixing quilting mistakes it’s the darker colors I use the most though, like
black, navy, and brown. I use these in a
number of different places.
First
of all, if you sew your regular seams with beige, every now and then that beige
will show through in the front of your project.
Just use a matching marker and color over the beige and its gone – like
magic! Very useful!
This
trick is also very useful on your backings.
If
your backing is a dark fabric – like black but you are using a light thread to
quilt it from the top, sometimes that top thread will show through on the
back. Once again, just use a matching
fabric marker and color over the lighter thread and it vanishes!
Stopping Mistakes Before They Are Mistakes
I
especially like these fabric markers for finishing off places on my custom appliques
that are too small to sew.
For
instance, the silhouettes of the smaller dragons on my dragon quilt had scales
and claws on their necks, tails and feet that were just too small to both cut
out and sew and yet they were essential to getting the right look.
This was a potential disaster, but I didn’t panic, because I know how to fix quilting “mistakes” like this.
I
simply cut out the dragons without these accoutrements and appliqued the
dragons. When that was done, I went back
with a black marker and using the original picture as a guide just drew in the
elements that were missing.
Ta-da!!
I did the same thing on my ‘Running Wild’ panel with the horses’ mane, because all those little wisps of hair were just too much to both cut and sew.
Other than the Dark Colors
This
is easiest with black silhouettes, but you can really accomplish it with any
color.
Depending
on the fabric you use, you might have to color in once, wait an hour or so and
then re-do it, as some fabric absorbs the color more than others, but it is
certainly well worth the time.
Finally,
I also use fabric markers on the backs of my projects if I have sewn something
down by hand and the thread color I used doesn’t match the backing fabric. Sometimes, it’s more important to match your
thread to the front than the back, and when this is the case, a magic marker
makes all the difference.
I used this trick on my ‘Ocean Maidens’ quilt when I sewed the silver buckle onto the front.
I
had to use silver thread so it would disappear on the front, but of course, the
silver thread was glaringly obvious on the back – so a lilac colored marker
came into play – and Bob was my uncle!
#3 How to Fix Quilting Mistakes
Using Hand Sewing
As much as we would prefer to do everything with our machines because they are both faster and neater, there are times when the only way to get something done is by hand. There’s a lot of detail to hand-sewing, way too much to cover here, so I’ve given it its very own blog ‘Hand Sewing; How and When’. It’s coming soon, and I’ll update you in the newsletter when it shows up.
Until
then, remember to keep some hand-sewing needles in your pincushion, and a small
pair of scissors around for clipping loose ends.
So
those are my three favorite fixer-upper tools when I need to figure out how to
fix quilting mistakes. I always have
these products around, and roughly seven times out of ten I can fix a
potentially major boo-boo without little or no trouble.
If
you have read any of my blogs at all, you will know that I love and use
appliques, A LOT! I think they are the #1 friend of a fabric
artist because they are the storytellers, which is what fabric art is all
about.
Things Weren’t Always this Good,
Kids
I used to avoid appliques like the plague when I first started because they seemed to be too difficult and time consuming. And they really can be if you follow all the ‘rules’ about how they should be cut and applied.
Learn how to applique to create magnificent statement & landscape quilts
I
had a friend who once made a quilt that had a swath of flower appliques across
one bottom corner.
Sound
simple? Think again. That “simple” took her almost 2 years to
stitch on (by hand) with stitches so tiny that her husband finally bought her a
large, stand-up magnifying glass that she could use to see her own
stitching. The whole process gave her
major headaches, and I was absolutely horrified by it all and swore off
appliqueing for life.
When
I started creating my own fabric art, however, I realized several things:
I hate matching
corners, so I had to find a different quilting style
Landscape is an
amazing alternate style, but you can’t do it if you can’t applique
So, with gritted teeth, I bought some how-to books and started learning. Being me, it didn’t take long to come up with a faster and easier way to do this, which I want to share with you here.
In the case of this panel, first the dark green background shamrock was appliqued down. Then the broken hearts were appliqued down. Then the golden rope was sewn down. Learning how to applique makes creating unique and beautiful projects like this one a fun and easy adventure.
Break the Mold – Bend the Rules
First
of all I asked myself; “Who’s ever going
to look that closely at my friend’s painstaking appliqueing job on that quilt?”
Answer,
probably no one, and if they do, they’re likely Quilt Nazis and who cares what
they think anyway?
Certainly
not me!
My mom – who was an extremely accomplished clothing seamstress used to say if someone was going to look that closely, then they had problems she didn’t want to even think about. I guess that’s where my attitude comes from.
So,
keeping that in mind, I came up with my quicker, faster, easier version of
appliqueing.
Principle #1 – Any Shape Known to
Mankind Can Be Made Into an Applique
It’s
not just about flowers, hearts, and stars.
Literally anything you can conceive of can be made into an
applique.
When I first started, I followed the appliqueing protocols and made my appliques out of tiny little different colored pieces of fabric that I laboriously cut out, laid down and stitched to make it look like a rose or whatever.
This quilt was one of the first places I used applique for an art project.
It seems incredible, but these appliques covered holes that were developing in these vintage squares.
As a quick aside, if you get into any quilting style you’ll likely figure out an easier way to do it sooner or later. But remember, emulate before you innovate. Doing it the “right way” the first time helps you understand the principles behind these techniques.
With
that being said, it only took this one project to make me go seeking a better
way.
Principle #2 – Keep it Simple
It’s
very hard to translate an elaborate shape with lots of little pieces, etc. into
a fabric applique. So look for the
simplest outline you can find.
For
other custom appliques I make a habit of envisioning the end result in my mind,
and then figuring out the easiest way to translate that to fabric.
I can see what I want in my mind, but translating that into fabric is something else so I went looking for help. My favorite resource for this is coloring book shapes on Google. If you type ‘Treasure Chest Coloring Book Shapes’ into your search engine, you will get pages of outlines of treasure chest shapes to choose from! Or:
Absolutely anything. It’s marvelous! Here is how to applique using these types of shapes:
Mermaid shapes
Rockets
Dragons
Print Out 2 Copies of the Shape You
Want
One
the size you’re going to use, and a small one as a guideline, because once you
cut the big shape into pieces, it’s often hard to figure out how it all goes
back together.
Plan a 3-Dimensional Outcome
Some
appliques can be cut out of just one piece of fabric – silhouettes – for
example; but if you want the others to look more realistic, you’ll have to use
more than one fabric.
My treasure chest applique on my Ocean Maidens quilt was made using a few simple layering steps:
The top and front
pieces were a dark brown fabric
The end (or side
of the chest) piece was black. This
makes the chest look 3-D in shading terms
The “steel”
strapping was gray fabric
The lines in the
boards were made with thin black yarn
You can also add hardware in the form of buttons to make a clasp or lock, or use hot-fix studs to effect the metal work on a treasure chest. With these simple principles you can make any shape you want into a beautiful, 3-D layered applique.
Another panel, another style of treasure chest and a mermaid!
Fussy Cutting Magic
This
is simply cutting an image you want out of a larger piece of fabric. The cardinals in my ‘Autumn Daze’ panel and
my ‘Christmas Carolers’ were made this way, as well as all the fairies I put in
anywhere I can.
You can add paperbacked soft-fuse to these images, and then use judicious stitching to pop out the 3-D effect.
Birds cut from one panel to stand out in another
The peacock and butterfly were both fussy cut from different panels
This
is one of my very favorite time-saving techniques when we’re talking about how
to applique, but as it’s a longer, more involved technique we’ll do an article
all about this later. But the most
important tip for fussy cutting is to always use a small pair of scissors with
very sharp points, to get into those very small areas in every shape.
This helps to stabilize your fabric making it easier to cut out. The soft-fuse also nips fraying in the bud for long periods of time, and it enables you to iron your applique down right where you want it – you can even re-position your piece once or twice if you didn’t get it right the first time.
Believe it or not…
The red feathers on our Freedom Flight panel are all appliqued down
There’s another article about this product, and you can read it anytime.
Principle #3 – How to Applique – The
Actual Sewing-it-Down-Right Part
Whew, we’re finally to the actual applique part of this project. And here you have to make two important choices; thread and stitch type.
Thread Choice
Do
you want your applique or the thread itself to be the real pop-out star of the
show?
If
it’s your applique, then choose a matching or an invisible thread that mostly
disappears unless you look very carefully.
This allows the applique to shine forth.
If you want the thread to pop – which is something I usually go for when doing flowers or mermaid tails – then choose thread that is a couple of shades darker or lighter than your applique so that it will show up well. Variegated threads and metallic threads work very well for this.
Without metallic threads these mermaids would fade into the background – plus mermaids are magical, and should sparkle!
How to Applique Using the Right Stitch
Type
I
use three different types of stitches depending on the effect I’m going for.
Straight Stitch
This
is when you stitch just along the inside edge of your applique. When you apply any type of soft-fuse product
you control the fraying somewhat, but you can’t stop it completely. This is known as raw-edge applique, because
when you stitch a straight line around an applique you will have a small amount
of fraying and the outer edge will look a little ragged.
I’m
not a big fan of this look unless I’m making something that should look fuzzy
and fray-ish, like grass, etc. However,
appliqueing with a straight stitch uses a lot less thread and is by far the
fastest way to sew an applique down.
Straight stitch also works best for appliques that won’t fray, such as embroidery appliques that you buy at the store.
And, sometimes, when you’re doing detail work – like on a mermaid’s face, for example, you just have to do it and put it as close to the edge as possible.
Blanket Stitch
A
blanket stitch is a straight stitch that throws in one zig-zag stitch every 3rd
or 4th stitch. It’s a great
combination of a straight stitch’s neatness, and a zig-zag stitch’s
security.
How
to applique with a blanket stitch is also a relatively easy concept – as you
don’t have to go as slowly or be so extremely accurate going around the outside
of an applique. The one zig-zag will
catch your applique if you miss the straight stitch part.
I use this stitch a lot on my fabric appliques like leaves, flowers, etch. They don’t fray hardly at all, and the blanket stitch mostly disappears on them, so it looks as if they’re just lying there by magic.
These types of silk leaf and flower appliques are sewn down using either straight or blanket stitches, while the tree roots behind them are appliqued down with a satin stitch.
If
your sewing machine will allow it, you can also reverse the direction of a
blanket stitch to accommodate your natural right-or-left-hand sewing direction.
Zig-Zag Satin Stitch
This
is my favorite appliqueing stitch because it finishes up your edges so
beautifully and stops all those little frays in their tracks.
I’m
NOT a fan of fraying – as you might have guessed. Actually, I loathe fraying, and I often feel
as though I’m in a war against those picky little threads. As I sew each section of a quilt together and
the frays are incorporated into the seams, I perform a little victory dance in
my head.
With a tight zig-zag satin stitch you can conquer your frays.
I
also prefer the satin stitch – which is just a very tight zig-zag – because
it’s more dramatic, covers everything and just looks cool. Variegated thread makes a stunning impact in
this instance, as in my ‘Summer Lily Table Topper.’
I used a matching metallic thread to satin stitch around the tails of my mermaids in my Ocean Maidens quilt and that really made them pop. The neat thing about a satin stitch is that you can make it as narrow or wide as you like to achieve the look you’re going for.
This is a typical use of a satin stitch as an applique technique – it finishes the raw edges neatly with no possibility of fraying
For sharper highlights, one alternative to a satin stitch is using embroidery thread strands
Or a satin stitch can be used to create delicate details, like the thinnest rays of this Star of Bethlehem in addition to appliqueing the fabric down
How to Applique – That’s All Folks!
And
that’s it. That’s all appliqueing is –
finding the shape you want, cutting it out, applying soft-fuse, and sewing it
down.
Don’t
let it frighten you. It’s actually a lot
easier than it looks, and like everything else practice makes perfect, or as
perfect as anything man-made can be. Plus
appliqueing is fun, endlessly creative, and saves a lot of time on matching
pesky points!
Karyl Fitzgerald is our latest Seam Ripper Champion – the absolute Master of Disaster, for her humorous take on a fracturing panel project that took her for a wild and crazy ride of mistakes made and overcome. Please join us in celebrating a fabric artist that hasn’t yet heard the words “quit” or “can’t” and keeps on making amazing pieces of quilted magic.
When I decided to fracture a Christmas Tree panel, I ended up fracturing more than my fabric; my fracture nightmare also fractured my confidence, composure and enjoyment into tiny little pieces that didn’t know each other anymore!
Like many of my “worst disasters” however, I learned a lot from my fractured mess nightmare, and I hope it helps ya’ll to have less troublesome quilting in the future.
Be Careful of Knowing What You’re Doing
Fracturing
is when you take a multiple number of identical printed fabric panels – each
with the exact same images. Then you cut
each panel into teeny, tiny little strips, starting at different points, and
sew them back together.
Your
starting number needs to be an even multiple; 2, 4, or 9.
You
could probably do more, but I have no idea why you’d want to. Honestly, that’s a lot of strips!
Fracturing,
by the way, is one of the most fun and easiest ways to turn a regular old
printed fabric panel into a gorgeous piece of fabric art that’s just right for
inclusion into a quilt, or into a large wall hanging.
I’ve
done fracturing before, most notably my “Poppy Water” panel, which worked
beautifully.
I
also enjoy fracturing, which is a bit of diversion for me since it smacks very
strongly of a precisionist style with all those tiny little seams and vaguely
matching points. So when I saw this
gorgeous panel of a Christmas Tree out in the snowy woods beneath the northern
lights, a light went off in my head.
Karyl Fitzgerald is the fabric art genius behind Princess YellowBelly Designs. A lifelong seamstress and artist with many mediums, she is spending her time these days making new quilt patterns that make it easier to create amazing quilts with new twists and combining multiple techniques. Of course, creating new techniques “as you go” is one reason she has so many stories of disaster.
Karyl grew up in the bush country of Northern Alberta, has been to the Amazon Jungle, spent a year teaching in South Korea, and married a rancher from Arizona. She’s the mother of three children, and all-around a fun-loving, adventurous gal!
Whenever your project is at this stage – there’s a lot of room for missteps in your near future!
The
panel already had a kind of watery, painted quality that made me think it would
look even more amazing as a rippled, abstracted beauty.
So,
I ordered the panels and prepared to create fabulous fabric art magic.
Fabric Art Techniques Can Take You
for a Ride
This
is, ironically, especially true for a technique that you think you know. It’s often a case of you knowing just enough
to make yourself dangerous. That being
said, there are lots of ways that a project can highjack your best intentions
and take you riding off in a strange and bizarre new direction.
Non-Identical Images – A Problem I
Couldn’t Control
The
first problem we (my daughters and I) ran into was the panels themselves.
Upon unpacking them we found the rich, vibrant Christmas trees were even more beautiful than the pictures had suggested, but they had been cut wildly off-kilter.
This
is, by the way, is a common problem with printed fabric panels.
I think they are probably printed on long bolts, and then machine cut. There’s no real attention to squaring up a panel, as long as they look vaguely rectangular, they get stuffed into a plastic bag and shipping off.
This isn’t a problem I’ve ever run into with panels I’ve purchased from a quilt store, at least not ones that don’t arrive there prepackaged, because quilt ladies cut these panels out by hand.
This was a big problem for a fracture project, because a basic fracturing principal is to work with identical images.
How do you square up a piece of fabric that doesn’t fit on a cutting board?
I don’t know. And, with that, my fracture nightmare was off and running!
We
did work out a process and square them up, a little, but the truth is our
pretty panels were still a little crooked.
Working a Pattern from Memory – the
Problem I Could Have Controlled
The finished piece might have been a little wonky anyway, thanks to the crooked panels. However, thanks to “knowing” what I was doing I really created my own fracture nightmare.
The
real problem was that I was lazy.
We had recently moved from a house we’d lived in for seven years – a very high-stress and pressured move – and the box with all my quilting pattern books had ended up going to storage instead of to our new place.
It was wintertime, there was a ton of snow on the ground, it was cold and stormy, and I just didn’t want to put out the colossal effort to go find my Fracturing How To book.
Besides, I just knew that I remembered how to do it from a previous project.
Some Changes are Necessary – Just Be
Careful
The
first thing I changed was to make the first set of cuts vertically, or
lengthwise, rather than horizontally since the panels were already longer and
you lose a little bit of accuracy every time you fold fabric to fit it on the
cutting board.
This first set of lengthwise cuts worked beautifully, it was the second set with the crosswise cuts that ended up in a wreck.
From strips…
To a panel…
To two identical panels that are ready to be cut apart again
Now I knew the panels were not perfectly square or equal, but I had a brilliant idea to offset that fact; I ironed in a deep crease down the exact middle of each panel before I cut my strips and re-sewed them.
I
figured the center images, the Christmas Trees themselves, was actually
identical, and since there was a lot of expendable background in the panel, I
could trim the differences down later.
Cue the Disaster Music
You
know how when the Pink Panther theme music would start on those old movies you
leaned forward to the edge of your seat waiting for Inspector Clouseau to fall
on his face from a great height?
Strangely
poor old Clouseau never heard the warning, and neither did I – even though it
must have been on full volume.
First I sewed the bottom half back together with my tree branches upside down – how, I don’t know, I marked the right ends and sewed them together – so that had to be ripped out and sewed again. Absolute fracture nightmare!
As the tree began to show up, it became more and more obvious that the branches were pointing up, instead of down, and that we had our sequence, strip to strip, flipped. Don’t ask how that happened – because I still don’t know!
Then,
I lined up each strip using the middle crease.
But
since that was somehow off to start with, my Christmas tree ended up looking
like it had drunk way too much punch.
Any police officer in his right mind would have charged me with an SUI –
Sewing Under the Influence.
So…I spent days and days ripping out one strip at a time and re-lining them visually. Of course, in a fracture, once you cut your fabric both length and crosswise you end up with these beautiful little 1” squares – so when I ripped out each row, the stitching would open up on at least half of these squares (both sides of the strip). And then I would have to re-stitch these before I could re-sew the entire strip back on!
How…?
Start tearing apart, by sets of two strips and carefully realign by sight.
This
was extremely tedious and I hated it!!!
But,
since I don’t like giving up on a project, I set my teeth and plodded on.
The
finished panel is very nice, but I’m going to dig my quilting books out of
storage before I try something like this again!
Tips & Tricks to Avoid Your Own Fracture Nightmare
I’m
proud of my finished panel, now, and glad that I took the time to figure, and
re-figure, each problem and keep on with the keepin’ on until I came up with
something beautiful. And I will share a
picture of my Christmas tree when I get it sewn and quilted into a finalized
version.
Never assume that
you understand a pattern well enough to do it without guidance (go get the book
out of storage even if it’s snowing)
If you get a panel
that was cut crookedly – take the time to actually make it straight, not just
sort-of straight, before you begin the process of incorporating it into a quilt
or pattern.
If there’s a
possibility that you can get turned around – even with careful labeling – try starting
somewhere near the middle, where you’ll see sooner that you’re making a bad
mistake. I started at one end, where any
normal person would, and on the white background I couldn’t tell that it was
all upside down until I got to the tree, which was like fifteen rows or more of
tight stitching on narrow rows.
Finally – the vision is realized! Was it all worth it? I think so, but I’d rather avoid these mistakes in the future, all the same.
Here’s
to your success in making great panels better, in using unique and beautiful
techniques in new and amazing ways, and in overcoming each challenge on your
road to being an even better fabric artist!
Next Championship
You
may have noticed that Karyl’s been our Master of Disaster before. Sadly this time we didn’t receive enough
submissions that adhered to our quality guidelines to let us choose a brand-new
Champion.
We
hope that next time – in just a few months – you’ll help us change this
trend.
After all, there’s no reason to be embarrassed about making mistakes or having struggles. To err is human, to overcome is the domain of an artist. We want to hear how our friends struggled, and how they overcame. We want to figure out mistakes before we make them, and to grow our knowledge and library of beautiful and unique fabric arts.
Please sign-up for our free newsletter, where you’ll receive the latest updates and also get notified in advance when we open up the next Championship!
Spray
starch for ironing quilting fabrics is another one of those inventions that
have made not only ironing but the entire quilting process a whole lot more fun
and accurate. Back in the day – when I
was a shiny new quilter still wet behind the ears – I only used water in a
spray bottle to steam iron my quilts, and this worked okay for the most
part.
You
should also know that I’m one of those quilters, who, for some strange reason,
cannot keep the steam feature on an iron working.
I’ve
had about five different irons in the last fifteen years. I follow the directions carefully, and use
distilled water to prevent mineral buildup, and within a few uses the mechanism
fails.
Even Michael – my own handsome Prince BlueShoe – can’t figure this one out!
Achieving a sharp, professional look is much easier with spray starch
The Advantages of Using Spray Starch
for Ironing Instead of Water
My
steam-destroying abilities is why I started using a spray bottle in the first
place, and maybe one reason I found it so easy to switch over to using spray
starch for ironing, since there are some things that water won’t do for your
fabric that spray starch will.
It takes a lot of water to get out
the really deep creases
You
actually have to get the fabric wet, not just damp, and hold the iron down on
it for a lot longer to get these deep creases out. Then, since the fabric is so damp, you have
to waste time ironing it till it dries.
Spray starch, on the other hand, will take even the deepest packing creases out with just a few squirts of starch and maybe 10-20 seconds of hard pressing with the iron.
Without spray starch for ironing the quilting fabrics, projects like our Summer Strawberry Table Topper wouldn’t really work.
Water will not stiffen fabric
Getting out the creases without spray starch is doable, if time consuming, but ironing with water will not stiffen your fabric – it leaves it in the same soft state as when you started. Using spray starch for ironing, on the other hand, stiffens your fabric nicely and holds it that way.
Therefore
it’s much easier to make straight and even cuts, and to sew straight
seams.
Something
I’ve noticed about quilting over the years is that fabric has its own
personality, and some fabrics are ornery.
Sometimes when I’ve used water, and cut a line I know was straight, I’ve
sewn it later and found what should have been a perfect 2 inch wide strip
warped.
This is because of the natural stretch in the weave of the fabric – and yes, even some quality batiks will do this, it’s just the nature of the beast.
To get from this…
…To this…
Your foundation seams need to look like this!
Spray
starch effectively immobilizes the weave of a fabric in the short-term.
As
with anything else, if you want the finished product to look great, you need to
spend time and energy getting the foundations right. In quilting, these foundations are your cuts
and your seams.
Water doesn’t make seams open up
It
takes a LOT more time to get your seams to stay lying flat after you iron them
open if you only use water. This can be
really annoying on some strip piecing projects, especially on Bargello quilts,
where the seams absolutely must be
opened.
When you use spray starch for ironing seams open, the fabric is already stiff, and just pressing the tip of the iron into the opening of the seam will encourage the seam to open up and lay flat for a few inches at a time.
As
an aside, if you sew a seam within a few days of having spray starched your
fabrics, you can use water spray as a way to conserve money on spray
starch.
Spray
starch can stand up to several applications of water steam before it starts to
wash out.
It is much easier to quilt over
fabric that is starched than it is on water-steamed fabric
Your
fabric will pull more evenly through the machine and not want to bunch up. It makes for a much smoother and professional
looking product.
In a Bargello project all seams must be ironed open and flat
And once they are…
…You can achieve this amazingly flat, crisp, and solid result.
Using spray starch for ironing quilt
backings helps to reduce quilting pleats
When
you spray starch your backing before you layer it with the batting, it is
surprisingly easy to iron out any creases and to keep them out. Since I started doing this, I never have to
pin my backing/batting layers – except for large queen quilts – and the only
creases I get (if any) are very small and hardly noticeable.
The Best Ways to Use Spray Starch
for Ironing Quilting Fabrics & Projects
Now that we’re all
in agreement about the benefits of using spray starch instead of just water,
there are a few tips to ironing with spray starch which will make your
experience much better.
Don’t spray the starch on the right
side of your fabric
Always
spray it on the wrong side. There are some fabrics that spray starch
doesn’t seem to adhere to as well as others, and the starch will leave a shiny,
opaque white residue that can’t be rubbed off.
This residue is subtle, but it will detract from the appeal of your
quilt if it’s on the front.
There’s
no telling which fabrics will pick this up and which ones won’t, and if you get
this stuff on the right side you have to wash the fabric.
Thankfully,
this residue doesn’t matter if it’s on the wrong side of the fabric. It doesn’t seem to make any difference to the
texture of the spray starched fabric, or gum up my machine, so if it’s hidden I
don’t fuss over it.
Spray starch every step of the way
If
you sew one section, then cut and re-sew – like in a crazy quilt, for example –
spray starch & iron again before you resew.
This helps to keep your different sections even and straight. I also like to spray starch my backing
fabric, as I mentioned above, as it really helps cut down on my pleats.
I will, however, add one caveat.
Some
fabrics, mostly the cottons you’ll get from non-specialty stores like Walmart,
will require constant spraying. Others, mostly
high-end batiks and landscape fabrics from quilt stores, will require minimal
spray starching, and will keep the spray starch even if you steam iron the
fabric with water several times.
A
general rule of thumb is that if a fabric feels slightly stiff right off the
bolt, then it’s going to hold spray starch well. If it’s soft and moldable from the get-go, it
will take more spray starch to keep the stiff, structured texture that makes
quilting so much easier.
As
you spend time using spray starch for ironing your various quilting fabrics and
projects you’ll develop your own instinctive feel for when to use, and when to
save, spray starch.
Don’t be afraid to re-starch fabric
after time has passed
Life
happens to the best of us. We all start
projects and get interrupted, then go back to it days, weeks, months, and even
years later. If I have starched and sewn
something and then put it away for a while, I always re-starch before I start
again, as it seems to me that the effectiveness of the starching fades over
time.
This
has its positive side, as well.
Once
you’ve made a quilt project, the spray starch will fade out even if you never
wash the piece, and within a month or two you won’t be able to feel any
unnatural stiffness in the fabric. I
think this is especially nice if you’re making a baby quilt, since babies and
kids have very sensitive skin.
Use the “low-weights, high-reps”
principle for stubborn creases
The
really deep, hard creases in fabric that has been folded for a while will need more
spray starch than normal. However,
spraying heavy amounts of starch all at once will increase your chances of
getting that icky white residue, and will also make the fabric tacky, rather
than stiff.
Instead,
try using two separate applications of starch, but don’t spray too
heavily. The creases come out much more
easily if you spray lightly (one or two spritzes), hold your iron down to the
count of 10, spray lightly again and repeat.
Buy your spray starch by the gallon,
and not the 16 oz. spray jars
Spray starch is one of those things that is much more economic to buy in bulk. For instance, I just bought a gallon of Mary Ellen’s Best Press from Amazon for $44.23.
This
may seem like a lot, but at my local quilt store they’re selling the 16 oz.
spray bottles for $18.50 each. Since 4
of these will fit in one gallon, the total cost of buying it this way would be $74.00. So, by purchasing it by the gallon, you’ve just
saved $30.00! Awesome!
I bought 2 spray bottles to begin with, and I just refill them from my gallon jugs. This is by far the cheapest and best way to go, because if you do much sewing, and get hooking on using spray starch for ironing – which you will – you’ll go through a LOT of spray starch.
The price varies from time to time, but it’s still the cheapest way to buy this essential quilting supply.
Don’t ever buy scented spray starch
They
usually add scents like lavender to spray starch. And it smells nice in the bottle, but once it
gets hot – YUCK!
Spray
starch has a pretty intense smell to start with, think about doing laundry in a
room with no ventilation and you’ll get the idea. When you add scent to it the smell tends to
permeate the entire room as well as your fabric. And unlike the efficacy of the spray starch,
the scent will linger until you wash the fabric in a machine.
Plus,
I’m one of those people who tends to have minor allergic reactions to certain
scents, and this smell gives me a headache, which I really like to avoid!
Be ready to get a new ironing board
cover regularly
Because
spray starch is by its very nature sticky, it will leave a bit of a mess behind
on your ironing board and your fingers.
Fingers are easily washed as are ironing board covers. But since a new ironing board cover costs
just a couple of bucks, I don’t usually both since it’s a bit of a pain.
I
generally get a new cover every year to 18 months, since the wear and tear of
various products takes a toll on these cheap cotton covers.
Our Recommended Brand of Spray
Starch for Ironing Quilting Fabrics
I’ve tried a number of different starches over the years, but have settled firmly on Mary Ellen’s Best Press.
It’s the least
messy, it comes with an unscented option, it comes in gallon containers, and
it’s easily available. If you haven’t used spray starch before or haven’t used
this brand, I would really urge you to try it.
Best Press has made
my ironing much more fun, and has helped to make my sewing experiences a great
deal less frustrating because it’s so much easier to get straight, even pieces.
If
you are the least bit observant, you may have noticed that as life goes, so
does quilting – or any other project you undertake. The beginning is exciting and challenging,
the end is – hopefully – rewarding
and satisfying, but the middle of a quilting project drags you down and hits
you with every negative emotion known to man.
The
middle of a quilting project is where you’ll discover evil “D” emotions:
Discouragement
Disappointment
Depression
Delusion
When your project looks like this – it’s hard to remember what it will look like in the end…
All of which usually leads us to ask, “Why am I even bothering with this?”
Quilters Have Great Need of
Endurance
My
friends we have need of endurance. I
really hate that word, endurance, but it is as completely essential in quilting
as it is in life. I’m thinking about
this right now, because I’m in the middle of my mermaid quilt and I am SO DONE
with it!
Unfortunately,
the quilt is not done with me.
I’ve
felt this way about a number of my projects – the dragon quilt comes to mind,
as well as my Lily Quilt Disaster. At
one point, I threw my lily quilt into a drawer and left it there for a year
before I could stand to face it again.
The good news is most of my little fabric art adventures don’t generate this kind of hatred, but when the middle of a quilting project is dragging me down like an extra hundred pound weight, I shift into survival mode.
Tips for Surviving the Middle of a
Quilting Project
As
with most other aspects of our lives that demand endurance from our souls, it
becomes easier to endure if you’ve got a few tricks up your sleeve. Some of these tips are practical, born from
experience, and some of them are psychological tricks to buck you up.
Either way, it’s essential to have a plan for when the going gets rough, because, my creative brothers and sisters, it will get rough sooner or later.
Tip #1 – Start another project
Having another quilting project – a much smaller project – that will take only a few hours or days of your time is a great way to relieve the boredom and tedium to be found in the middle of a quilting project.
Potholders is one project that you can get very creative with and finish in the course of a morning or two. Being able to finish something, anything, will help you feel positive about your skills again and regenerate your enthusiasm.
Tip #2 – Big projects and hard
deadlines don’t mix!
Never
start a big project when you’re under any kind of deadline. If you want to give your brother a double
wedding ring queen sized quilt for his wedding, for example, consider giving it
to him on his second anniversary.
All
the extra pressure will just exacerbate those negative “D” feelings that inevitably crop up in the middle of a quilting
project, and those emotions make it even harder to finish on time.
Tip #3 – You’re not making the whole
quilt, just this one section
I
recently read that “a man, having one backside, cannot sit two horses.”
Beyond the hilarious visual image – this is actually quite true. You’re not sewing the whole quilt in one morning. All you’re doing is attaching this applique, or stripping this section, or cutting this strip of binding.
So
try breaking your project up into manageable sections and only do one section
at a time. That way, if you find
yourself falling into the “middle of the quilting project doldrums” you can
just leave it and sew something else in between.
This
way, you won’t feel guilty about having an unfinished project because you
planned it that way!
Tip #4 – Be a show off
Show
the parts that you have finished to family or friends and bask in their
praise. Oftentimes you’ll be seeing a
mistake or problem in your quilt which a third party won’t even notice.
I
recently showed a project of mine to Barb – it was a fractured panel center,
and I had sewn all the horizontal strips upside
down! She didn’t notice, and
couldn’t see it when I pointed it out.
All she saw was the gorgeous twisting colors.
These reactions will really help re-up your enthusiasm for the entire enterprise.
The first Seam Ripper Champion ever – Karyl’s Summer Lily Quilt – was a great example of horrific struggles through the middle of a quilting project that yielded amazing results!
Tip #5 – Give yourself permission to
go slowly
The
more beautiful a quilt the harder it will be to get just right.
Keep
reminding yourself that fabric art – versus just quilting – is much more
involved and will automatically take a lot more time to complete. It’s much more important to do it right than
it is to do it fast. So give yourself
permission to be slow.
Tip #6 – Out of sight, out of pain
Put
your project away for a while. Make sure
it’s completely out of sight so that the nasty little guilt tripper that sits
on your shoulder and whispers in your ear will have nothing to say.
Tip #7 – Take a long look back
Look
back at some of the other difficult projects you’ve completed but thought you
never would.
Years
ago I made a double wedding ring quilt that my kids named ‘The Never-Ending
Quilt’ because it took me so long. But
now it has lived on our bed for 9 years already!
And
if you’ve never made a quilting project before – look back on another hard
moment of your life that you overcame with some patience and perseverance.
Just
keep reminding yourself that this too shall end and it will be worth it! Remember – Patience is not only a virtue, it’s
an essential in fabric art.
Special Announcement – Open Submissions!
Patience,
endurance, perseverance, and hard-won successes are the driving forces behind
our Seam Ripper Championships. Princess
YellowBelly is all about sharing rough experiences, not-funny-at-the-time
disasters, struggles with evil “D”
emotions, and that all-consuming battle in the middle of a quilting
project.
That
way, you can overcome the next struggle more easily.
Right
now we’re holding the first ever “open submissions” for our Seam Ripper
Championships. That means you don’t have
to be a member to submit your story of struggling with and overcoming fabric
hardships.
But we’re only holding this open till the 23rd.
To find out more about this opportunity, read the submission guidelines, and send us your tale of tragedy and triumph, go to the Seam Ripper Championships page! I can’t wait to hear your story.
Some quilters,
like me, want to make beautiful quilts without matching points. One of the easiest and best ways to achieve
this is by sewing beautiful landscape quilt designs. Landscape quilts are bold, eye-catching,
individually unique, and in my opinion a lot easier to sew and quilt than most
traditional patterns.
But with these
quilts you can’t start in the front – with your snow-capped mountains or your
fairies on flowers.
You have to start
with the background elements.
A background, by its very definition, is in the back. For most of us this translates as “not as important” or “the very least important part of your quilt.” After all, it’s the main pattern that you want people to notice. That’s where your talent shines.
Believe it or not – there’s a series of traditional pinwheel squares behind these colorful fish.
And this is true
as far as it goes, but we need to recall that old saying, “Behind every
successful businessman is his wife.”
In other words, in
any endeavor it’s the hidden, nearly invisible, foundation that has to be built
correctly in order for the structure to be of any use. So let’s take a look at how that translates
into fabric art.
Backgrounds Matter in Every Quilt –
Not Just Landscape Quilt Designs
Although backgrounds are vital to the success of any landscape quilts, and landscape backgrounds can also be a lot of fun, other quilts have background elements that need to be treated with respect in order to work.
Backgrounds are
the biggest areas in quilts and are therefore important.
If you don’t pick
the right background color or pattern, you’ll waste all your time, money and
talent because the “front pattern” will not pop out like it should.
I once spent 3
weeks selecting and cutting pieces for a double wedding ring quilt.
My choice was a
dark blue that matched the blue in the flower patterned fabric that made the
wedding rings – the “front pattern.”
After all that, when I sewed the first part together it was awful! Everything vanished and the pattern was
totally obscured. So it was back to the
drawing board for me.
Understand Quilt Backgrounds
We used a zipper back background on this autumnal wall hanging. The tree trunk cover much of the long-short stripping, but the effect is still to create an abstract, believably blurred out background.
To avoid this kind of waste, here are a few tips that will help you skip past the “learning from your own mistakes” section, straight to the “WOW” section.
Take the time to just think about
what you want your project to be and do.
Whether
it’s a small wall hanging or a king quilt, everything you make should have a
purpose which can vary from keeping you warm, to beautifying your home, to
impress, to show love, to tickle your funny bone, etc.
Backgrounds provide one of three
functions:
To fade
into the background. In this instance,
your background is simply providing the foundation for the real pattern or
foreground to live on.
To focus
most of the attention on a single entity in the pattern such as a mermaid,
dragon, house, etc. Here the background
does not fade out but enhances the foreground.
To carry
the same importance as the foreground.
This occurs when your background (as in our Running Wild panel) is the
equal to the foreground.
Choosing the Right Fadeout Color
If you want the
background in your landscape quilt designs to fade in the overall field
of vision a pale, muted color is best – beige comes to mind. Maybe I should call it cream, since it sounds
so much more sophisticated!
Seriously, though, look at the fabrics that will make up your main pattern, and you might be able to choose one of the colors in that to use as a background.
Although it looks like a plain cream background, if you look closely at this example of a landscape quilt design, you’ll notice that there are 4 different cream colors in each “leaf.”
This was the case on my famous/infamous ‘Home Pastures’ quilt. There was a certain shade of blue in each of our three main printed fabric panels. We took those panels to the quilt store, and searched through the entire selection of blue until we found a fabric that picked that shade up – and we used it as the sashing – which can be a type of background in itself.
If the choice
doesn’t just jump up and smack you in the face, try this:
lay out all the fabrics you think might work
Then lay one piece of your main design on top and see
which ones look yucky, okay, good, great, and fantastic. Of course, you want to use the one that looks
fantastic.
If you can’t decide, get another opinion. Michael and Suzanna are both great at
this.
Even
though your background is the largest part of your quilt, if you pick the right
color for it, your eye will see it but your brain won’t. This is also true for strongly contrasting backgrounds
– if it’s right, it vanishes under the weight of the overall effect.
Choosing the Right Focusing Color
When
the purpose of your background is to focus all of a viewer’s attention on
a single entity, you need to think and plan very carefully. Achieving this effect is more a result of
purposeful strategy than simply choosing the right color.
This
principle is often used in nature photography.
A background, even a very strong background like a mountain, is blurred out in order to focus all the attention on the bird or flower or whatnot.
The Milky Way Baby Quilt is at least 93% background, and a layered background at that. But the entire effect is to focus your eye on one tiny applique at the top – the cow jumping over the bucket and the moon.
If
you look at a Thomas Kinkaid painting, you’ll notice that everything points to
one place – usually a house. He achieved
that effect with all the background details and his unique use of light.
You
can do the same with your fabric art.
Pick out one or two things that you want to focus viewers’ attention on, and then pick images (flora, fauna, water, wildlife, etc.) to enhance that.
Most of the time these types of backgrounds are very busy, like my coral reef panel. In some landscape quilts designs, however, the more austere your background, the better your main image pops.
So
it all depends. There are no hard and fast
rules here.
Choosing the Right “Backwards Coming
Forwards” Color
As
crazy as this sounds, sometimes your background needs to be your
foreground. This mostly occurs in very
strikingly austere quilts such as silhouettes.
When
you make a silhouette, your foreground is one solid color – usually black. In order to make that pop, you need a very
striking background. We use this design
element in projects such as ‘Running Wild’ & ‘The Cowboy and His Lady.’
The sunset colors in the background are the focal point.
In my Camel Panel, I used a darker constellation fabric for my background, and even though the black silhouetted camels are in the foreground, it’s the night sky that you see first.
Once
again, lay out your fabrics, and try different combinations until you’re happy
with the look.
A
nice side-effect of this type of project is that it’s hard to go wrong. If you have an idea of what effect you want
to achieve, and your silhouette is easily recognizable (like a horse) then your
background will become stunning pretty easily.
Use the Background to Create
Movement in Landscape Quilt Designs
One
of the major differences between traditional quilting and fabric art is that
quilting creates a pattern, and fabric art creates a picture.
Since
we’re interested in the unique and creative, obviously we want our fabric art
to do more than just lay there looking impressive with all our point matching
exactly.
One of the ways fabric art mirrors reality is by creating movement.
This particular project is still under construction – eventually though these wide borders will be a “tidal pool and silver net” background for the central mermaid panel.
And
I’d say that approximately 59% of the movement in a quilt should come from the
background elements.
Since
we’re talking fabric art here, movement is achieved with fabric and the
patterns you put it into. Many quilting
patterns naturally mimic movement, and the limit to making them take flight is
only your imagination.
Landscape Quilt Designs that Create
Movement
A
few of my favorite patterns for creating movement in landscape quilting designs
are:
The pinwheel
Bargello
Zipper back
Strip piecing
And patchwork patterns.
These
patterns mimic movement in and of themselves, but when you purposefully design
the colors to create one effect, level to level, from the beginning, it really
enhances the effect.
My
best example of this is my Coral Reef panel.
If
you look closely at the background, you will see I used a pinwheel pattern. I
constructed 3 levels of these, starting with the darkest down against the sand,
then a medium level and lastly a very light level, to convey the impression of
moving upwards.
Next,
I used one or two of the same fabric in each level (note the lime green) to
help draw the eye back and forth.
And
even though your eyes may not consciously notice the background here because of
all of the stuff happening in the foreground of this panel, your brain notes it
and says “water”.
This
same technique works just as well for any project and any pattern. Bargello is all about using the same colors
in different layers, to draw the eye and create movement.
Pay attention to the fabrics you use in your designs. There are so many different ones out there with circles, swirls, dots, zigzags, starbursts, leaves, bubbles, etc. If you use these in your background patterns they will automatically create movement all by themselves and enhance your illusions exponentially!
As
with all fabric art, the creating is the glory, so let your inner genie loose
on your backgrounds first!
For
quilters everywhere – but especially for fabric artists – free motion quilting
is the most fun you can have outside of bars & bed. In fact, as my amazing quilter friend Barb
often says, “Quilting keeps us off the streets and out of the bars,” in the
first place.
You
might be able to tell that free motion is my favorite part of the entire
quilting process.
I
can get positively tipsy on the entertaining, creative liberties of
freewheeling around loops, spirals, feathers, shapes, and those odd jigsaw
shapes only I understand. I guess this
is because it incorporates two of my favorite elements in fabric art; thread
and freedom.
Thread
is one of my guilty addictions, I positively adore it.
I
love the plethora of colors and the way they can enhance any project; the
colors…thicknesses…textures…variations…and possibilities.
The freedom comes with the free motion capabilities of my machine of course. And I do recommend that any creative quilter buy a machine that has a free motion quilting foot and put it to good use! But I also geek out over the opportunity to quilt whatever and wherever I choose. It’s extremely liberating!
“FREEDOM!!!”
It’s
also a little intimidating and overwhelming the first few times you try
it.
For
those of you who are used to being told exactly what to do and how to do it
every step of the quilting process, this is completely understandable. I used to do things this way, and I would
obsess about the final quilting process – especially when the pattern would
say, “quilt as desired.”
I
mean, what did THAT mean? Gradually,
though, I realized that I could quilt almost anything, and it would look great,
especially with the right thread choice.
As
I share my journey from timid, mouse-in-the-corner, follow-the-lines quilter to
a freewheeling genie, I hope you’ll get inspired to unleash your inner creative
tiger, and let loose in the colorful world of thread and free motion quilting.
Plastic Guidelines for Free Motion
Quilting
As I quickly learned
quilting styles like “quilt-in-the-ditch” will only take you so far. And while those are useful techniques that
certainly have their place in certain projects, you can do and be so much more
when you drop the feed dogs and spin your quilt through the machine.
Using Iron-out Pens
When I first started with
free motion quilting, I bought a lot of those plastic quilting guides that you
lay down over your project and trace over with an iron out pen.
This is great if your
project needs a specific pattern, but is very impractical when you’re doing a
large project as it takes a long time.
Ya’ll may remember my great capacity for patience…so, yeah. Moving on.
Using plastic guides also uses up your iron-out pens pretty quickly, and those puppies don’t come cheap!
This panel was quilted using iron-out pen to create a sun-ray guide – which works great for small projects.
Using ponce chalk
After this I tried the
ponce and chalk option. A ponce is
basically a small box with a sort of cheesecloth bottom. You fill the box with powdered quilting chalk
and bang it down over your plastic quilting guide until the chalk marks out
your quilting design.
I found out that while it certainly is faster,
it’s also a great deal messier, with chalk on everything, including up your nose and in your eyes.
The biggest trouble here
is that powdery chalk, by its very nature, rubs off, and you can only do
relatively small sections at a time.
Also, I discovered that some fabric is slippery (even cotton ones), and
the chalk just slides right off.
Also the pattern is much
clearer if you have extra hands hold the plastic guide down – and my kids had a
weird aversion to me banging the ponce down over their fingers. Go figure.
So now, if I have a
specific pattern I want, and the fabric is dark, I will use chalk, but I use my
chalk line drawing tool and I only do this if the overall project is
small.
This method made the star shapes on my ‘Camel Panel.’
Unavoidable Errors
I
also learned that the only real way to get a perfectly quilted design is to
have a long-arm, computerized quilting machine.
But since I don’t have $30,000 to spend on a machine that won’t fit in
my house anyway, I had to learn to live with human errors.
At
first these unavoidable jigs and jags would make me wince, but no one ever noticed them except me, and given
enough time, even I could barely find them.
So
I thought, “what the heck, why go to all this trouble if no one but me really
notices.”
Next, I bought a few free
motion quilting how-to books that teach you how to do this the “right”
way. And if you’re drawing challenged –
like my girls – these might really work for you. I can’t recommend any of them, however,
because that’s not how my mind works.
I also find it impossible
to make every shape the exact same size each and every time.
This is especially true when I quilt the feather shape – my feathers change size and shape with alarming regularity.
You can see the unevenness of this quilting design if you look for it – but it only adds the naturalistic style!
Natural Free Motion Quilting Styles
Finally, I found a teaching video by Judy Hansen entitled Free-Motion Quilting for Newbies, it’s an absolutely super teaching video.
What I liked most about it was that Judy gives you permission not only to experiment, but also to make what I used to call a mistake but she only considers variations in the pattern. As she says, “Nothing in nature matches, so don’t worry about your quilting patterns matching exactly.” What freedom!
This permission slip really started my creative juices flowing, and now I am fearless when I start quilting a new project.
No one will know you’re perfect –
even if you are
The thing you’ll notice
is that non-quilters will be so awed by your talent that they’ll never notice a
few wigs and wa-wa’s. More importantly,
when you stop trying to impress everyone with your perfection you’ll set your
soul free.
Amazingly enough, you’ll
also find that the brain sees what it expects to see. Your eye may be seeing one thing, but your
brain will present a completed image.
For example, if you’re
looking at a quilted piece your brain will show you a beautifully quilted
overall pattern, no matter the wa-wa’s.
You have to actually stop and look very carefully before your brain
picks up any ‘imperfections’.
Most people will not take
the time to do this, and you’re home free!
Listen to your quilt
This’ll sound weird to non-quilters, but if you listen to your quilt project every step of the way, it will tell you what pattern that it wants to be quilted with.
For instance, my ‘Winter Wonderland Panel’ wasn’t originally a fantasy landscape. I came to understand, however, that there were fairies hidden in the woods. They were shy, but definitely proud of their wings.
So, if you look closely, you will find 3 sets of fairy wings in my quilting.
In the mermaid quilt that
I’m currently sewing, I’m going to use a wave pattern, as the borders represent
the ocean. So look carefully at your
project and let it tell you what it needs to really shine.
Thread – Thread – Thread – And More
Thread
Think carefully before
you pick your quilting thread.
The color you choose will
make a great deal of difference to the finished look of your project. Here again, the quilt will let you know.
Sometimes you’ll want to highlight the design and not the quilting, and so you’ll need either invisible thread or a color that matches exactly. This is what I did with my mermaid panel. I wanted her to shine and the quilting to be almost invisible.
If the opposite is true,
and the quilt design isn’t such a much, pick thread that will really make your
quilting design pop right off your project.
I like to try my choices
out on a scrap of corresponding fabric first, to make sure that my thread color
and design are going to look like I think they will. Practicing on a fabric
scrap will also let you adjust your tension and motor speed. If something isn’t right, you won’t have to
pull it out.
Think of everything in the box
To aid in picking out the right thread, I go through all my thread boxes and pull out anything that I think might even remotely work.
If I can’t tell if the thread is right just by laying the spool on my project, I unwind about a foot of it and puddle it on my project. This makes it fairly easy to see what it will look like once you sew with it.
Don’t be afraid to try some really odd combinations – sometimes the weirdest thread/fabric combos are just what is needed.
A word about the importance of
bobbin thread in free motion quilting
Your bobbin thread is
important – and usually you’ll want it to just disappear into the backing of
your quilt. Sometimes, however, your
machine will drag the bobbin thread through to the front, just enough to
show.
If this happens, make sure that your bobbin thread disappears on the front even at the expense of the stitching showing on the back.
Before you load your bobbin into the bobbin case, I highly recommend that you first insert a magic bobbin washer. These are Teflon washers that feel like plastic. They go between your bobbin case and your bobbin, and fit any home sewing machine.
They’re made by a company called “Little Genie” and are absolutely magical in what they do for your quilting! If you’ve ever quilted a project and turned it over, just to discover a bunch of birds’ nests, you will know why you need this super little invention.
Such a simple thing, yet these little washers will eliminate 95% of all backlash tangles and birds’ nests on the underside of your quilts.
They come in a package of
12 and are very reasonably priced. Since
they’re made out of Teflon they don’t wear out – I’ve only ever purchased one
package and I’ve been using them for about 6 years.
The only trouble is that
if you’re not careful when you take your bobbin out of its case, these little
rascals will pop right out and fly away.
Good thing I have my kids
to crawl around on the floor to find them again!
Not All Quilts Are Quilted Equally
Once you know what
pattern you want to quilt and the top thread you’ll be using, give some thought
to different areas of your project.
You may want to free motion quilt around the shapes in the panel, and then stitch in the ditch around whatever quilting blocks you’ve used to enhance the panel – as was the case with my ‘Home Pastures’ quilt.
Some areas only need a
straight quilting stitch, no matter the pattern you’ll be sewing, but sometimes
a smaller area will be screaming for a fancy stitch. If your machine has this feature, don’t be
afraid to explore these. My Bernina has
about 70 fancy stitches and I use these a lot, but only in small areas.
A word of caution, each different stitch usually has a motor speed that optimizes the pattern. If you try sewing that particular stitch too fast or too slow, the pattern will be skewed.
Here I used free motion quilting to follow and enhance the shapes of the feathers.
On the peacock’s neck and body I used free motion quilting to emphasize the stained glass – while on the flowers I used the same free motion quilting to sew the centers down.
This used to frustrate me
horribly until I sat down one day with a lot of scrap fabric, and played with
each stitch and the motor speed till I found the optimal combination. I wrote it all down and Suzanna made me a
chart that I keep in my sewing feet box.
Now, all I have to do is
reference my chart and I’m good to go. I
would highly recommend you do the same for your machine – it saves a great deal
of time, frustration and thread!
Let’s Go Freewheeling with Free
Motion Quilting
Now
you’re finally ready to start!
Your quilt sandwich
ironed and crease free
Your machine is
loaded with your choice of thread
And you’ve set
your machine to the stitch you’ve chosen.
Now it’s time to put on
the clear plastic free motion quilting foot, drop the feed dogs, position your
quilt at your chosen starting point, and put the pedal to the metal.
Tips to Make Your Free Motion
Quilting Go Faster & Look Better
1. Don’t
trim your project before you quilt it.
Free motion quilting is
especially bad at warping a quilt sandwich in every direction. If you trim before you quilt you will have to
trim again when you’re done and you could lose important parts of your design.
2. Always start as close to the middle of your
project as possible.
This helps you to smooth out any excess fabric to the edges as you quilt and eliminates bunching. As you quilt, use your hands, wrists or even your elbows to hold your fabric taut. The tighter you can hold it, the smoother your finished project. Once you have the middle done, move out towards the edges, smoothing as you go.
3. Get rid of thread tails before you start
quilting.
When you arrive at your
starting point, drop your free motion quilting foot, hold onto your top thread
and run your needle through the quilt once to bring up the bobbin thread. Pull
this through to the front, backstitch a few stitches and then start
quilting.
This eliminates all those
pesky thread tails on the back that get tangled in your quilting and are a pain
to snip out later. I used to make the
kids do this job, till I learned this trick, and they almost kissed my feet
when I started this practice. Also
remember to backstitch when you arrive at the end of your stitching, and snip
off your thread as close as possible both front and back.
4. Don’t be too impatient to get all your
quilting done in one go.
I used to be. Take the time to stop and tie off when the pattern demands it and then start again somewhere else. It makes a real difference to the final look. It can also make a difference to the warping of a quilt – as you can drag the sandwich completely out of kilter if you quilt too heavily to one side or the other without balancing it out.
5. Don’t hesitate about changing your thread
colors.
If you don’t like the
effect of a thread on a differently colored section or the project demands
it. Different colors in different places
can make different design elements pop.
Sometimes you may want to use metallic threads in places like eyes (on
panel quilts) or match element colors, like on landscaping quilts with
distinctive skylines.
6. Consider quilting gloves.
I have tried wearing
those white quilting gloves that are supposed to help your hands grab the
fabric more securely – and they do. But,
(and there’s always a “but” isn’t there), they are a real pain when you need to
work with your thread. Being who I am,
this drives me crazy, always having to take them on and off so I stopped using
them. If this doesn’t bother you then use them by all means, because they do
help.
7. You can experiment with other quilting
helps
Safety pins, bicycle
clips, and more help some quilters – but remember that these will always have a
downside. How you quilt best will depend
upon your personality (patience level), how big your quilts are, and how easily
you find it to create patterns without a guide.
8. When you quilt always remember to use a
fast speed but slow hands.
There is a great temptation to swoop and dart and swirl around with your quilting because fee motion is so freeing. However, if you do this (and I did at first) your thread won’t be able to keep up, and there will be many places where your thread will jump large spaces, the quilting will be uneven, and you’ll be able to pull the entire line out with your fingers.
Here I used free motion quilting to trace the figures of the panel with gold thread – creating a 3D effect
So always remember, fast
needle and slow hands!
These
are all the tips I can think of right now.
There is nothing like laying out your project after you’ve quilted it
and being thrilled with how it’s turned out.
So be brave intrepid fabric explorers and let your inner quilter loose!
