Let's Do Some Microstippling

Felt particularly calm today and thought that I would explore the microstippling 'pokies' issue. Ever since I have had the new machine, I have been slightly out of sink with the microstippling as the machine has a completely different rhythm than the domestic sewing machine and I struggled to find the right speed and movement. While I could manage I obviously have come across the 'pokies' on the top or bottom issue, particularly with different threads on top and bottom.

Used my Practice Ruler Quilt for some experimenting as that quilt will probably end up as a cat mat. I needed to use something real where I had room to just go for it. Used a maroon coloured Aurifil 50/2 on top and cream colour in the bottom, definitely a recipe for hours of fiddling. Yep, did a lot of fiddling with the tension, but once that was set, I refrained from fiddling any further and tried different things with the top thread, i.e. thread net,  feeding the thread through only 2 holes, 1 hole before it goes to the tension disk, bobbin genie etc. Reasoning was that the tension gave me a perfect stitch if I just quilted 'normal' lines...it was the change in direction every few seconds that seemed to be causing the issue.

The problem was that I had the top thread coming to the top, but only on certain movements...

Hard to see but believe me some sections looked absolutely horrific. Could not get a grip on that but realised after a while that this was not solely tension. Lowering the tension was not an option as I would have pokies galore on the backside. Determined, I took my thread through only 1 hole before the tension disk and then just went for it for a number of those triangle sections to see what was happening. Obsessional, I know, but I really wanted to understand what was happening.

After a while I found a speed I could manage really well, i.e. not too fast but not too slow either, being able to make nicely rounded shapes but then I noticed the above happening on the back of the quilt. Took me a moment to work out the reason, but in the end I figured that this happened with the lint that was accumulating in the machine. Had plenty of evidence of that...

I cannot believe how sensitive these machines are. Here I was for months on end trying to figure out why I could not get this right. After this realisation I briefly went around with the brush every time I stopped. This did not eliminate all lint, but helped a lot. Moral of the story...Aurifil might not be a good choice of bobbin thread on this occasion...in the future I will combine my Aurifil 50/2 top thread with a prewound Deco bob which is 60wt and has far less lint. After having done the whole border and managed to get a good rhythm going I felt that this is probably the solution...at least for the way that I do microstippling.

This is how my microstippling looked in the end...hardly any pokies and way more consistent than I started. Really got that rhythm going in the end.

And here is my border half way done. I am planning on doing a 1/4in grid on the other side. 

Karin

Insanity Plus

YES!, I finished micro stippling the centre of my wholecloth. This took forever ... as much as I like the texture and look, this was insane. The area to stipple was huge and I nearly gave up half way through. Came up with all sorts of excuses why I had to be doing something else...in the end, I perservered because I was also aware that if I stopped, it would be so much harder to pick it up again (and maintain the approximate size of the stipple).

Centre of Wholecloth finished

Look in the left hand corner...I bought some Pinmoors when I was ordering some supplies from the Internet the other day.  Leah Day uses them a lot so I am going to trial them a bit. Bought one packet which is not enough for a whole quilt but it is such a shift in what I am used to. Somehow they don't look secure enough, so I put the two in to see whether they fall out during the handling of the quilting. Of course, they don't, actually I was surprised how firm they are and am a bit amazed that they stay put. What I like about them is that they don't leave big holes when you pull them out and also they are of course, much easier to put in and pull out.

Anyway, for  the whole week I was going to start on a new baby quilt, washed all my fabric etc. but could not begin because I had this enormous area of the wholecloth to finish off (would be great to have two machines). Promised myself not to do this again...famous last words! In the end, I did not even like it anymore and thought it looked pretty boring. Mind you, also perfected my approach to micro stippling, i.e. be recklessly imperfect, stay in rows and vary your shape slightly for a nice interlocking design. Overall, I did a good job and any inconsistencies are really not noticeable ...the thread colour (I used Aurifil Mako 50/2) that I have chosen blends in perfectly and the 'bumps' across the quilt look quite natural.

I did this on my new Pfaff Expression 4.2 with the new Dynamic FMQ foot which is round rather than square. I had very good visibility with that foot and found that if I stayed in rows it was easy to anticipate how to interlock the stitching...problems only tended to present themselves when I got into an area where I had done some unexpected stitching, i.e. gone down too far on the previous row or left a bit of a gap in the previous row. In terms of shapes I think of Micky Mouse ears...as funny as that sounds...having that mental image helps me to stitch out a stipple. If I let go of that I find that I start losing myself in the shapes and end up just doing snake type lines.

 

The new machine has 3 LED light...very happy with this. This photo was taken at night while I was stitching (yep, any excuse did do to just do something different for a moment)...see the light in the right hand corner...just brilliant, made such a difference. I will have a break from this quilt now for a moment. For the borders I want to put in more feather designs both in the inner and outer border. This requires some marking and a lot of concentration.

Now I can set my machine up for piecing and finally start that baby quilt. Mind you, while I was stippling away I also had a brain wave for another design...I reckon I probably start  both because I am a bit curious as to what that would look like. Thinking about a multi coloured Dresden Plate where I could use up some leftover Jelly roll strips. Watch this space...

Linking up to Anything Goes Linky Party at Stitch by Stitch

Until next time

Karin

Progress on Wholecloth

Continued on my microstippling of the centre of the wholecloth. While I was doing this I was thinking that I need to definitely branch out into other filler designs.  Microstippling is great but fairly work intensive...my hands were positively cramping after doing a particularly long stretch. It's not that I do not know other designs...there are plenty around and I can do a number of them. I struggle with visualizing the outcome and keep coming back to the microstippling as this is something I know in terms of its texture and looks. Also with this piece I worried that a different filler, like swirls for example might just be too much (as I am planning more feathers in the two borders). In retrospect though, a swirl patterns or something similar would have gone quite well as the thread blends in just perfectly...

Anyway, got the centre of the piece done

Happy to report that  I was less picky on how this all turned out...finally settled into a happy medium of  yes, this will do with all its little irregularities and bumps. Very pleased with myself as I can be extraordinarily perfectionist.

The whole thing compacted considerably and I wonder whether I will have issues doing a less compact design in the first border

And last, not least...the back. As usual I like the back almost better than the front and was thinking why I did not do this quilt on black in the first place

Linking up to Leah Day's FMQ Link Up

Karin

Continuing On My Wholecloth Quilt

Remember this beast?

Sat down yesterday to start to fill the middle section. In retrospect probably should have made the wreath a bit bigger. There is a lot of space to fill. Thought for a moment about what filler to use but not having FMQ for a while I thought I better stick with the microstippling. Used my new Dynamic Spring foot which worked like a dream. Visibility was very good which still surprises me given that it is a closed foot. And the 3 LED lights in the new machine were fantastic, definitely made a huge difference in seeing where I was going. This is how far I got in one sitting. Had to stop there ...can only do microstippling for a few hours and then I start losing the rhythm...

Microstippling

Close up of Microstippling

Not bad for an evening's work...really want to get this finished as it has been lying around for a while. And then there are other UFO's to finish...

Linking up to Anything Goes Linky Party at Stitch by Stitch



Karin

Microstippling Completed

I finished the microstippling!

Hilarious...I love the back of this quilt almost better than the front.

 

 

Looking forward to the next part...more feathers.

Karin

Microstippling

Finished the major quilting in my quilt and am doing the surrounding areas. Decided to microstipple in the black surround with black thread...what craziness!!

Had to put all the lights on in the room plus use my OTT-Light...in the end I had to lay down the OTT- Light behind the foot shining directly onto the area to see where I was going (and even then it was a bit of a challenge).

Probably hard to see in photos but turned out quite alright...flattened it nicely and like always - not a line crossed (I wish).

Having major problems also with the bearding on this quilt. I am using a bamboo batting that I had left over. I distinctly remember thinking about the bearding when I was doing another project (which was a light project and did not impact that much) but obviously had forgotten about this when it came to this quilt. THIS IS IT...I am not using bamboo batting again. While the batting is nice and soft and easy to quilt, the bearding is actually quite bad and is distracting when FMQ, particularly in the black areas...quite a hassle to clean that up before you can even start quilting. Not looking forward to the outer boarder which is all black and at the moment looks like fluff all over.

Well, on with the show...once I have finished this I am thinking of doing more feather work in the borders.

Heading over to FMQ Friday at the Freemotion Quilting Project with Leah Day.

Karin

UFO Sunday #9

I did a lot of work last Sunday on my little crazy wall hanging.

In retrospect, the idea of the panel was great, but next time,  I will look at the size of the motifs a bit more closely because this panel is very small, hence outlining these tiny bitses was a bit of a hassle. Mind you, I will never again feel reluctant to outline anything after having gone around tiny cat ears and teeny-weeny birds.

I continued to outline the major bits and then started to microstipple around the shapes. Seriously, I think my stipple is more of a nanostipple it is that tiny...and all this with white thread on a white background, enough to drive you insane. However it got done and not a line crossed (ha, ha...). I can be absolutely assured that this thing will never become undone, ever. Don't know whether you can see it, I even outlined the tiny nine patch block pictures...it was hard to stop after a while. How great is the wool batting. The cats just about jump out of the panel.



Microstippling

With that done I tackled the house because this was seriously puffed out. Not wanting to nanostipple again I just followed the bricks and the windows...a bit untidy because it is so small, but never mind, it got the job done.

Then the border...decided to stick with my idea of the loops and worked some stars into it...all on a bit of a smaller scale. I chose this as I don't find loops that easy if I have to fill an area with them. The design always looks so easy-going but is actually quite tricky because it sends you in a certain direction, so you always have to think ahead. And well, the stars...I have struggled with them in the past  but after the first few on this border I got the hang of it. Bit wobbly, but adds some charm to it, I reckon. I did this in variegated thread which had the added advantage of allowing me to place the stars at pretty regular intervals...just had to wait for the colour change.

 

And tada...did the binding over the week...here it is, all finished.

Cat Wall hanging 18" x 22.5"

Had a few anxious moments as I could not remember whether I had washed the fabric beforehand. I carefully wet the edges before I washed it...Yep, must have washed the fabric beforehand...no colour runs, not even a hint. Dried it a bit, then blocked it and managed to square it off pretty well (mind you, it is so tight, there was not a lot of 'give' in there).
 

After I had done all this, I actually remembered that I have two more panels sitting amongst my fabric stash...totally forgotten about them. One small lighthouse, similar in size to this and one big panel with lots of blocks printed on it...here we go, should really finish them off. I reckon they have been sitting in there for at least two years. Should really be counted as UFOs as I had all good intentions to finish them quickly by just quilting over it.

Linking up to Leah Day's UFO Sunday on the Freemotion Quilting Project

Until next time

Karin

UFO Sunday #8

Thanks to Leah Day for answering my question re the amount/density of quilting on my little 'cat' wall hanging on Question Thursday #35 on the Freemotion Quilting Project. That was very helpful, particularly re the need to quilt the border a bit more densely. I was wondering about that...now it is just a matter of working out what design to choose.

I did make a start earlier in the week and microstippled the area around the house and yes, the sun (and moon) popped out nicely.

This took a while to do but was a great warm-up. I then outlined the cats underneath it...not sure whether I will leave it like that or whether I might do a bit more on that area, but I thought it needed some variation, rather than microstippling every single area.

Next, I pondered over the cats above the house and finally came up with this

 

 

Here is a bit of a close-up

I did not want to microstipple again and thought I just follow the wood grain lines...now those cats just about jump out of the wall hanging. Great 3D effect with the wool batting. This is also a design Cindy Needham had demonstrated on the  SewCalGal Freemotion Quilting Challenge during June. I had not tried this before and must say, what a great way to flatten an area quickly and effectively (yes, I am a bit of a lazy quilter). Like Leah had suggested I outlined the cats and heart first then started the lines in the left hand corner moving one by one across each section, i.e next to the left cat first, then moving on to the section between the heart and the cat from top to bottom and up again the other side making my way around to the other cat. Too easy...lines are not straight, I just followed the wood grain feature loosely and it looks great.

Also stitched out my motif again...not totally freehand. I wanted a stitched out decent sample of this, so I used Golden Threads paper with the motif drawn on it and stitched over it. I love doing that...the noise of the needle going into the paper provides an excellent rhythm to the stitching and I always produce very consistent stitches with the paper. Like it. No major problems with the sweeping curves and the feathers came out decent enough, just have to make up my mind whether I use the backtracking method or just backtrack across the top. Got a bit confused at times. If you can imagine this as a quarter of a motif this actually would look quite nice and there are several possibilities in orientating this. Also would work as a border motif with just two of them either up or down next to each other.

 

I am really enjoying just 'playing' around a bit with different things at the moment as usually I am under some self imposed pressure to work on a major project. This year has been good in that I have been able to truly concentrate on developing my skills in FMQ and to let go of the need to produce quilt after quilt. Mind you, I have spent last weekend washing a whole lot of fabric ready to start a quilt using the 'Sweet Gumleaf' block I was talking about last Sunday. This might be my major project for the next half year if the block works out.

Linking up to UFO Sunday on the Freemotion Quilting Project 


Until next time

Karin

Quilt Along #12

Wow...this was very challenging indeed. The first time I looked at the wholecloth quilt on Leah's post I was not sure whether I could do this. Must admit I was very pleased with my little quilt last week, thinking that this was all going really well.

So with my new found confidence I tackled the microstippling. While it looks alright, I found it incredibly difficult. My first problem was to stay in loose rows when filling out shapes, i.e. the hearts. You would think I would get it after so many hearts to fill in, but for some reason I started filling out one area, making it across, back again and then usually ran into trouble of not having enough space left. I tried all sorts of ways, changing direction, starting at a different spots but somehow did not quite get there. Not that it really matters as it is not very noticeable...however in some hearts, I ended up stopping on the side of the curve rather than neatly at the point.

The next issue was consistency. As Leah suggested I did complete sections in one go as I knew that would be an issue for me. I did the middle section first then the surrounds, hearts and finally the outer section. I did  complete the outer microstippling in one hit...it was huge. I noticed that I was getting bigger as I was approaching the end, so those two areas don't really match up all that well. Also, because I had to really concentrate on the scale I often have whole fern frond shapes due to not changing the direction of the shape much...this happened a number of times when I was losing concentration or focusing in on the scale...some more practice is required with this.

I paid no attention to the actual stitches. I could only do this with the speed set at the highest level and really going for it. My stitches have all sorts of issues in there, i.e. some build-up of stitches when I hesitated, some squared up loops, jerky stitches and a stitch length that is probably no more than 0.5 - 1. Hence, undoing any of this was not an option...given the stitch length, unpicking any of this would have been a nightmare. I also think my needle wore out. In the end I had some skipped stitches and the needle eventually broke after I had finished the piece and was just playing around on a practice piece. Every now and then I was in the zone and it went very smoothly but as soon as I thought that, I would loose it again and loose my rhythm when getting into tight spaces. Overall, good practice though...very pleased that I actually finished this. I do like the look of it ...very effective...but very labour intensive.

The final product

Don't really have any questions...Leah's post was really informative and the issues I did come across seem to be a matter of practice, practice, practice...

Until next time

Karin