QUILTsocial | Issue 03 Spring 2015

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Quilting the Challenge Quilt Curved safety pins about a fist width apart A pile of binding The fabric sampler Thread choices Q 18 ● .com spring 2015 UILTsocial At this point, the quilt top is finished and ready for the quilting stage. It has been a lot of fun seeing how the the three different blocks and the applique pieces for the What’s Good For the Gal Is Good For the Guy quilt have developed and emerged into a whole entity. I love creating the individual parts of a quilt but it’s also satisfying to see it all put together. What is even more satisfying is seeing it quilted. There are few things that need to be done first before I can actually sit down and quilt. The three layers I already have the top layer finished and ready to go but I still need some batting and a backing for this quilt. The batting I have and I just need to cut it to the correct size. It’s 100% cotton, which is one of my favorite battings. It’s a low loft batting so will remain quite flat when quilted. If I use a batting with polyester, which has more loft, the quilt would have some puffiness to it. The backing I will create from a fabulous piece of flannel. Now, when I started the challenge way back when, the idea was to create a pieced back using some of the Eclectic Elements fabric and the backing fabric. Unfortunately, I don’t have enough of those fabrics left to create a backing. But, I do have an idea to create something else with them — shhhhh don’t tell as it’s a surprise. The backing is a single fabric in lovely blue flannel by Northcott Fabrics, which will be warm and cozy to the body. Sandwiching the quilt I’ve rearranged my studio and put some tables together so I can sandwich the three quilt layers together. Once the layers are all layered smoothly, it’s time to do a whole lot of pinning. I’ve made sure that the backing and batting are 2-inches larger than the quilt top all the way around. It’s always a good plan to have these two layers larger just in case there is any movement of the quilt layers. There’s nothing worse than having a section with no backing or batting. I prefer pinning to spray basting even though it does take longer. If you pin well, there should be minimal movement of the layers while quilting. TIP Place pins about a fist width apart — this will ensure optimal pinning for minimal movement. Binding I like to make the binding before quilting the quilt to have it all ready to go and I don’t accidentally use the binding fabric for something else. I decided on one of the feature fabrics for the binding — stripes in blue and tan. This fabric is going to look super framing the quilt. Plus, it looks great with the backing fabric that it is lying on. When I calculate how many strips to make for the binding, I keep it simple. All I do is add the measurements of each side together and add an extra 20-inches to ensure overlap for sewing the ends together. then, I divide by 40. Not exactly an exact science but it works for me and there isn’t all kinds of convoluted measuring or matching involved. For this quilt that’s 72" on each side, I rounded up to 80" (this will include the extra 20" I normally add), multiplied by four to get 320" and divided by 40 which equals eight strips of fabric. Easy peasy! Picking a thread I made a little sampler of some of the feature fabrics and the background fabrics to test a couple of threads. I did both straight stitch and free motion samples with each thread. Because all the fabrics are a bit different, it’s hard to get a thread that will blend into all the fabrics. I don’t want the thread to stand out because I feel the design is the focal point of this quilt, not the quilting. My two choices of thread are a variegated blue or a variegated gray. I’ve decided on the blue for the background and, most likely, the gray for the feature fabrics. But, I may change my mind when I start quilting the feature fabric and go with a variegated brown, since many of the blocks have a brown tinge to them.
The denim 'corner' pocket sewn on the backing is a great detail. It proves to be very useful for holding cell phones, iPods, chocolate (?), whatever floats your boat during those difficult university days. Quilting the quilt The large throat space of the Creative 4.5 is going to make the quilting so much easier. Another bonus is the great lighting on the machine — four LED lights really light up the work area. This will help me to see the blue thread on the blue background. TIP Rolling the quilt makes it easier to maneuver the quilt within the machine. You can even secure the roll with bicycle clips so it won’t unroll — these clips are used to secure your pant leg from getting caught in the chain. I’ve put the open-toed decorative foot on the machine so I can see where I’m going with my stitching. Make sure to also pick a foot that's compatible with the IDT system. The system needs to be engaged while quilting to ensure that the three layers of fabric move smoothly under the foot and over the feed dogs. TIP Always start quilting from the center of the quilt working out to the edges. This will ensure any movement of the layers towards the edges of the quilt rather than towards the center where unwanted bulges could remain from the movement of the quilt. I’ve decided to do straight quilting on the background fabric. My reason for this is that I think that if I do a free motion design it will take away from the actual design of the quilt and the feature fabrics. Plus, to me, the straight lines are much more masculine than a free motion design and, since it’s for a young man, I’m going with my gut feeling. Check out my earlier posts here and here on QUILTsocial.com, for a complete tutorial on free motion quilting, and ideas for free motion quilting designs. I haven’t quite figured out what I’ll do in the feature fabrics yet, but I’m leaning towards some echo quilting of the shape of the feature fabric in the block. Open-toed foot in place ready to quilt Quilt rolled and in machine One alphabet option Making the labels I have to say that I’m not the best one for putting labels on my quilts, but this quilt will have a label because I have an embroidery machine to make a label! The PFAFF Creative 4.5 also has an embroidery component — an awesome one at that. I need to add a phrase to this pocket. As well as another phrase on the backing and then of course the label with the name of quilt, who made it, and so on. To make these labels, I can choose from several different alphabets within the software of the machine to embroider phrases. If I wasn’t happy with any of those fonts, I could download one from the computer to the machine to use. Lots of options. Q UILTsocial .com ● spring 2015 19
Page 1 and 2: Q .c Spring 2015 • 7 quilting des
Page 3 and 4: Editor's letter scissors measuring
Page 5 and 6: 48 36 c o n t e n t s Jennifer Houl
Page 7 and 8: What’s good for the gal, is good
Page 9 and 10: Pieces ready for sewing with the qu
Page 11 and 12: I like to glue my first fabric piec
Page 13 and 14: Hour glass block added to design Ex
Page 15 and 16: Lots of hexagons Cut shapes along t
Page 17: Sewing the applique shapes After sp
Page 21 and 22: good for the guy... Constellation Q
Page 23 and 24: good for the gal... Elaine Theriaul
Page 25 and 26: Get more quilting fun in A NEEDLE P
Page 27 and 28: Prepping the Ruby Royale I installe
Page 29 and 30: Sew Fancy Inc. Quilting design from
Page 31 and 32: Next up was to add some mortar to t
Page 33 and 34: Choosing the lettering was easy as
Page 35 and 36: Quilting on the message on the back
Page 37 and 38: skill level intermediate finished m
Page 39 and 40: Q UILTsocial .com … eat, sleep, q
Page 41 and 42: Happy Spring Banner Cheryl Stranges
Page 43 and 44: 3. Remove the fabric and stabilizer
Page 45 and 46: picking fabrics Flowers are a breat
Page 47 and 48: 6 5 4 Tulip Template Trace 3 of eac
Page 49 and 50: BANNERS OF F Visit our booth and: V
Page 51 and 52: Finish up some quilting projects...
Page 53 and 54: Pressing using a pressing sheet Art
Page 55 and 56: Closeup of machine stitching on the
Page 57 and 58: Now to sew on the binding Now that
Page 59 and 60: Only Spooling Around Nancy Devine N
Page 61 and 62: Quilting the Only Spooling Around t
Page 63 and 64: Canada’s most trusted notions bra
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Page 67 and 68: cr cr eativ 100% cotton thread thre

QUILTsocial | Issue 03 Spring 2015

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