The Right Thread Makes All the Difference

After struggling through FMQ with some cotton quilting thread I had, I was about ready to give up. I tried everything I could think of to keep the thread from breaking. I changed my needle, adjusted tension, re-threaded the bobbin. Cleaned my machine. Nothing helped. A last ditch effort involved purchasing some Isacord thread, recommended by Leah Day. If this didn't work, I was going to give up on free motion quilting all together.

I'm extremely pleased to tell you that it worked like a charm. I've been playing around with FMQ for the last two hours and haven't had my thread break once! WOOOO! YEAH! GO TEAM! And suprisingly, I'm having an easier time with the small concentrated patterns than I am with the large sweeping stippling type patterns.

Pebbles take For-Ev-Er to do

Actually, I solved two problems here - I wanted to practice FMQ before I quilted with it, but I couldn't stomach wasting fabric that could be put to better use. However, I happen to have a box of random 9" - 11" squares that I picked up. I can't use this fabric with other projects, because I don't think the fabric has been washed. Also, some of it is the ugliest fabric I've seen yet. Solution: use it for FMQ practice.

When all was said and done, I started requilting the purple cat quilt. This is the one that I purchased clear thread for, which kept breaking. Of course. But I picked a design and practiced it, and now am quilting!

The colors are a little funny due to the fact that it was located under my sewing machine when I took the picture. I still need practice, but I'm finally getting somewhere.

In other news, I picked out five more star quilt blocks to make with white backgrounds. This way I can make a decent sized baby quilt with the nine blocks. After that, I'll be switching to the black background star blocks.

This one is called Maine.

Now that I have hopefully solved my quilting problems, I may be able to get a couple of those UFOs off my list.

No New Projects Weekend (Okay, One New Project)

I promised myself I wouldn't start any new projects this weekend. Which was rough, because my bargello quilting has been especially difficult and I just wanted to throw it aside and forget about it for a while. I spent more than 2 hours tearing out quilting that "eyelashed" around the curves.

My "eyelashing" problem. No, I didn't invent that term - I found it on another quilting website!

 Now I obsessively stop every few inches and check my tension. 75% of the problem turned out to be that I was going too fast around the curves, so I slowed down. Also it seems to be VERY important to raise the presser foot before threading. It still didn't stop my thread from breaking at least once a sunflower but I finally got all the quilting done, tedious though it was. The density of quilting is a little uneven, but I think that will improve with practice. The binding is on and just needs to be hand-stitched along the back.

Completed quilting with binding half-stitched

I've been looking for an interesting way to use some of my scraps from my scrap box. I'm not a big fan of the typical scrappy quilt. However, I did find a couple of great options. My favorite thus far is the Mod Mosaic Quilt Block by Elizabeth Hartman. Her tutorial includes a downloadable pdf.

Mod Mosaic Quilt from Elizabeth Hartman

In the case of her example block from the tutorial, I would have NEVER chosen to put all those fabrics in the same block. I think they clash. However, once the sashing is added and the block sewn together, it looks amazing! Perfect for using up scraps.

 Also making good progress on my purple Kool Kats Kwilt and I'm really enjoying the unusual symmetry of the quilt.

Since my crafting supplies budget is suddenly and unexpectedly eliminated, I've been doing research on suitable substitutes for quilt backing and batting. It was a pleasant surprise to learn that batting can be anything from a lightweight sheets to cheap fleece blankets to mattress pads to sweatshirts, and the backing can be made of anything cotton or flannel. Quilting started as a recycling craft, using leftover scraps for the top and anything warm for the batting, back in the "good ole days" when expensive craft stores were non-existent and pioneer women had to make do with what they had. I'll be bringing back a little old school quilting over the next several months, raiding thrift stores for old sheets and blankets. Should be interesting!

Oh and by the way, I totally failed at not starting a new project. I just couldn't resist trying the Mod Mosaic. Dug into my scrap bin and ran with it.

All in all, it came out pretty nifty! I've got a weird combination of prints. Someday I'd like to do a coordinated one, maybe in all reds or something.

Free Motion Bargello - Win Some, Lose Some!

Remember this?

Well, I started quilting it today.
I choose the Sunflower pattern from the Free Motion Quilting Project.

And I had mixed results. Also, FMQ seems to be tough on my hands (I occasionally have carpel tunnel issues) so the going is slow. But I am getting a little better at it. The hardest thing is regulating stitch length.

And also, making the needle go where I want it to go. :)
I have chosen to space the sunflowers out and using a traveling vine to go between. I'm also using a variegated thread which doesn't show up very well on the front of the quilt.

Ah well, live and learn.

Vertigo

I decided to practice my free motion quilting and found this great website, The Free Motion Quilting Project with hundreds of patterns and videos on how to FMQ. I killed two birds with one stone by turning an orphan block (UFO) into a mug rug (yay!) and using a FMQ pattern to quilt!

As you can see, my lines aren't quite straight, my tension is slightly iffy, and my tracking is horrible. But, still the best FMQ project completed yet. It really helped that I had a pattern printed out to look at instead of just winging it. The quilt block pattern is called Vertigo and I think that is appropriate. The pattern with the quilting almost makes you dizzy and gives this neat 3D effect. Next... Binding! Actually, I usually kind of sort of don't like the quilting process, but the FMQ with the variegated thread was fun.

I also finally finished my last Project Linus blanket for the the year, which gives me three to donate.

This is a new feeling for me. I usually don't complete my projects, but I've already got two UFO's done this year.