The Cutest Panel

I am in clean up mode, trying to get rid of some of the panels that I have collected over time.

This particular panel I have had for some years...it is called 'Jungle Friends' by Deborah Edwards for Northcott Fabrics. Finally cut this panel to size which is always a challenge as the material is never entirely straight, i.e. it is a bit tricky to get fabric and design perfectly straight, particularly if you are a stickler for detail like I am.

Decided to do another clamshell allover design...really like that for little baby quilts.

 

Here are the tools that I used...a simple circle, the Handiquilter Multi Clamshell tool and the little fluorescent green disk (which I need at times to hit the right spot).

 

I did not mark the design on the fabric as I am basically a bit lazy, however I did make some marks on the bottom to get the first row exact to be able to build on that.

After this I used the red circle to mark the center of the clamshell as I went along.

That was just to make sure that I hit the center point exactly and also served in subsequent rows to give me an idea whether the row underneath was slightly off.

I quilted the clamshells with the 4in HQ Multi Clamshell tool.

As you can see I have drawn a line with a permanent marker through the center. This is again to align it to the row underneath. Trying to just eye that out is just too difficult. 

So I went along pretty straight, however had some shifting again higher up in the quilt. I think I might have to replace my sticky grips on the ruler as I tended to slide over a bit. In the end I was out by about 1/8in and had to undo two of the rows to get back to a more accurate design. A hassle, but as this is a rather smallish quilt, it did stand out a bit and it would have bothered me if I had left it. 

This is by far the cutest panel. Was able to exactly match the orange border to the colour of the animals. Looks really pretty and feels wonderful with its wool batting inside. I will put a matching green binding on this to finish it off.

Already found a recipient for the quilt which was a bit of a surprise, but great...don't need another quilt lying around.

This was good fun and I am already planning for the next panel that needs to be finished.

Karin

I’m Back

So much so for all good intentions of posting more regularly...have let it slide again. Have a number of excuses...life got a bit busy as usual and then we went on a holiday to New Zealand (which was great). Found a little fabric store in Auckland

Truth be known, I have struggled with motivation over the past month or so...

I was working away on my Wholecloth and actually got quite stressed with it as the deadline for our show here is the 1. June. Things just were not working properly and I reckon I made several ‘planning’ mistakes. On top of that I was getting tired with the amount of repetitive quilting. This is how far I got

I then had a bit of a moment where I thought ‘this is ridiculous...this is my hobby and should not become a stressor (got enough of that at work!). So I stopped...accepting that I will not enter a quilt in the show this year and the world will not come to an end! Went on my holiday, had a fantastic time and when I came back started on the Handiquilter challenge that my local group is currently working on. As I was running behind by a month I had to knuckle down, piece a quilt together and get back to ruler work. Almost caught up with the task for the second month now and must say that I am enjoying the ruler work immensely.

Also had another (refreshed) look at my Wholecloth...will continue with it, even though I now think that I should have thought that framework through a bit better, however it will still look great when it eventually gets finished. All good learning...will finish it in between other things as the repetition of that piece is seriously boring and the thing I struggle with most. Definitely finding out where my passion sits in terms of Wholecloth quilting.

Karin

New Rulers

My new arc rulers arrived from the US

They are the Lisa Calle's Pro Echo rulers. I got size 8 and 12 thinking that this is probably of most use to me at this point in time. There is a whole set of sizes available and I would have liked some additional sizes but with postage this is all I could afford without being overly greedy. Husband made remark about  how many more rulers I could possibly need...wow, I can think of plenty more!

I stitched out some arcs in the following sample (first two spaces from top down)

Effortless alignment, very happy with that.

The next 3 spaces of arcs were done with the Westalee Corner Mark Ovals

You might have wondered why I got those...they are extremely useful in creating arcs of different sizes. If you look at the last space, I used the smallest of the three ovals and got five different sizes out of that by just aligning it to the next quarter inch mark. This represents very good value for money and would be very useful for different sashings and smaller borders. If you then look at the bigger ones, there are a lot of sizes in there, so for that reason alone I think they are useful to have in your repertoire of rulers, i.e. able to make just simple arcs, interlocking designs and a variety of orange peel designs, all in a multitude of sizes. This was a better option for me than buying a dedicated swag design set with a few different sizes...found that a bit limiting and wondered how often I would use that. Similarly, did not want to end up buying different size ovals as standalone rulers as I am then limited to a few select sizes. 

That's it for me for a while with rulers...unless I smuggle them into the house 😜

Karin

Progress on Practice Wholecloth

My practice project is coming along. However today, when I finally sat down to continue we had a power outage, so I did not get as much done as I would have liked.

I have been stitching this wholecloth to practice a number of things
- to try my new circle and arc rulers
- to try a new thread - Magnifico from Superior threads
- to continue to explore the HQ Sweet 16, i.e. how different will it be to stitch something that is quite familiar to me but obviously will feel completely different on the Sweet 16

and then I added to the list
- used the wave ruler to put in a spine line for my feathers
- stitched my feathers freehand around just for fun

This is how far I got today

The thread continues to give me trouble...I used Bottomline in the bobbin. Funny enough the yellow thread is no problem but the blue and the red appear much more fiddly to me. Periodically throughout the piece I have had moments when I had to adjust the tension and literally go through the whole process of testing and re-testing etc. In between also watched several YouTube videos on tension. I think I know how to set the tension correct but for that blue thread, it just wants the bobbin tension so much tighter than I thought.  I will take the thread to my HQ group and asked about this. However I also have discovered that a different thread in the bobbin, something like SoFine 50/3 or Rasant  (i.e. something closer to the weight of Magnifico) works much better for me...the stitches look better and I get the correct tension without much trouble. So that is something for me to remember. If it does not work so well with one combination of thread, try another...
For this piece however I continued with the Bottomline...also a very good exercise for me personally to have something that is less than perfect. The feathers were a lot of fun to quilt. I felt in a pretty happy place with the machine...still going snail pace (how slow did I stitch on my DSM?) but getting into the rhythm of this machine. Stitching the feathers completely freehand was great. I used the backtrack method even though the bump back method would have probably been more appropriate, but I like backtracking...this worked very well for me at a slow speed and I was able to keep my feathers more or less consistent. Lesson learnt...the corners should really be marked in! I did them also freehand thinking that I could just have a little look of how I did them in the first corner but by the time you concentrate on your stitching, that reference point is gone and you are locked in fitting them into the space you are quilting. Let all of this go and was pretty happy with myself. Still looks quite respectable. Once I echo around that a few times the differences will not be that noticeable. Also did some in-lining in blue and practiced some speed. What a hoot! Made it up to 20% and had a laugh as I am very far away from being able to do them properly, even though the feathers are easier to quilt at that speed, i.e. they come out a bit smoother but my stitches were way too short at that speed for the time being. Will have to continue at my snail pace for a while.

From here the plan is to do a bit more filling in the center and to put some background quilting around the center and then I am thinking that I might put some piano keys as an outer border using my favourite ruler, the Line Grid ruler. I love this about wholecloth quilts...there is always something more you can do. However for this one that will then be the finish. I had ordered some fabric from the Fatquartershop for my next wholecloth which has already arrived, so I am already thinking about the next quilt.

Linking up to Let's Bee Social over at Sew Fresh Quilts.

Karin

Practice Wholecloth

I am making progress and learning a lot by my mistakes, mainly to do with my lack of planning with this little quilt. Absolute must to put your framework in first before filling anything else! I am sure I have said this before somewhere but obviously have not committed this to memory. Maybe it will stick after this time ☺

Decided my wreath needed something else and ended up putting another circle in underneath the arcs. Must say that this got a bit messy because of the compaction already happening so this is not going to be a 100%. However I did want to have a look what that looked like. Yep, like it!

Now, back to the filling.

Karin

Tension Trials and Tribulations - Part 2

Before I continued on my wholecloth I stitched out Patsy Thompson's little task from her online January Ruler Workshop.

Patsy shared a stack of information both on Monday and Friday last week talking about the two different channels that give some life to otherwise pretty simple shapes. Don't be fooled...while this may look basic I did pick up a few hints (like you need to have a plan!) and definitely found out that I need to do some more work on parallel channels, particularly the 1/4in ones. While I stitched them with no problem they all are slightly different widths and this problem occurred seemingly always on the right side. Maybe the way I align the ruler on that side? Need to explore this a bit more.

I hope we don't need that sample for anything else as I then used it to trial a different colour for my wholecloth. Still Magnifico 40wt but this time in red. Strangely enough this had a slightly different tension and I had some difficulty working this out.

As you can see there is some red poking through on the back. I spent some time again going through the process of adjusting the tension. This was not easy and I think in the end I actually had the tension a tad too tight but I then went onto the wholecloth anyway to put in a featherette. Did not want to obsess about this as this thread is obviously a little bit difficult for me and for now this is good enough. 

Looks ok from afar, but I must say I do not like the stitches. What is it with the colour 'red'. I know I cannot blame the machine for this as I also have difficulties stitching with darker colours on my DSM. Just does not look that great. Anyway, I continued with hyperquilting with some blue Magnifico thread in the outer feathers.

Bit out of practice with the hyperquilting. Looking at the photo now realise that the heart shape in the feathers leaves a lot to be desired...I reckon that they should have been a little bit bigger, filling out the space a bit better, but so be it...not too fussed as this is just for a bit of fun/trial with rulers and some different thread. Was happy to get back to the yellow colour for the outlining which does not seem to give me the trouble that I had with red and to some extent with the blue as well. Incidentally I did try the Magnifico thread also with a different bobbin thread using So Fine 50/3 and liked the feel with which it was moving along much better. Seems that a thread closer to its weight might be better. Unfortunately I do not have So Fine 50/3 in a cream colour, so I continued with the Bottomline thread. 

I am going to stitch some feathers around this and I might try to pair the Magnifico with a cream Rasant thread (Tex 24) which is similar in weight and have a look whether this is less fiddly. Anyway happy with my efforts so far...not sure I will use this Magnifico thread on another wholecloth. While the thread is beautiful, I don't like its slippery nature. Just not used to it and had some trouble with the locking of stitches. But then again that might just be me at this point in time.

A little bit more filling as this looks way too naked and then I will stitch the feather border. 

Karin

Tension Trials and Tribulations - Part 1

I spent the last 2 days trialling a new thread on my Sweet 16. I have had the machine now for just about 6 months and after my initial meltdown over the adjustment of tension (see this post) have settled in to the new machine. It is starting to feel better but I am by no means as comfortable as I was on my DSM. Still struggle with speed, locking stitches in a tidy fashion and in general not being ‘in sink’with the machine.
But it’s getting better...I followed Jamie Wallen’s advice on one of his videos and stuck to just one thread for the last 6 months. Aurifil, of course! It’s the thread I love, I know how it behaves and I was able to get that to work most of the time on the Sweet 16. However, when I got the machine I also got a box full of thread from Superior...yummy colours, all sorts of types of thread, so I finally found the courage to give that a go. I chose Magnifico to start with...a 40/2 trilobal Polyester thread. The sheen on that thread is just out of this world. Very beautiful.

Looked on the Superior thread chart which gave me a Towa gauge number (find information about the Towa gauge HERE) to guide me in the right direction. Those numbers are measured with prewound Superbob bobbins. As I had some of those, tried that and got my first taste of how finicky that thread is...must emphasize that it is finicky to me and that is probably because I have only rarely used Polyester thread. Not sure I like the feel and how slippery they are.
I then used my (not prewound bobbin) Bottomline thread as I needed a cream colour for my practice wholecloth. Here is where the Towa gauge becomes particularly useful. My wound bobbin behaved quite different to the prewound one, i.e. I needed to tighten the bobbin severely on the one that I had wound on the bobbin winder (I did not question my bobbin winder as I feel it is set quite right - the bobbins are not spongy but also not super rock hard, so I did not adjust this as I feel the bobbins are wound correctly). So I started at about 200 on the Towa gauge...should have taken photos of the next steps but it was one of those slightly frustrating processes. However I got through that in about an hour...a huge improvement in contrast to my earlier experiences. It went something like this:

- bobbin thread poking through the top, so reduced top tension
- bobbin thread still poking through, so reduced top tension to a level where it was just too loose (was pleased as I definitely can feel that now by pulling the thread towards me above the needle)
- tightened bobbin tension, however still being pulled to top (how strong is this thread?)
- looked at my thread path; the Superior guide talked about a thread net-tried this but this increased the top tension even further
- decided to only guide the thread through 2 holes...now we were getting somewhere. Here is a bit of a practice run using the different colours (blue, cream and red Magnifico), but more on the colours later.

Can you guess which web site I have been looking at recently?

Over the next 2 days I did manage to get the tension acceptable and started my wholecloth with my new toys, the circle and arc rulers.

I must be the world's worst marker...a plan would have been good, but I am a bit hopeless when it comes to marking. Always start off really tidy (marked the main frame on the fabric and attempted to mark the arc in) and then the creative mind takes over and ...oops, this needs to be different, let’s just draw over this or even better, wipe away with some water etc...always end up incredibly messy and the need to put in special marks to work out where I am going. Hilariously annoying!

The wholecloth is a practice run for the different thread, but also to
- try out my rulers and I mean really try them out, i.e. explore the markings, look at how to best hold them and generally getting a feel for them
- work on a more puffy quilt scenario (used cotton and a thin layer of wool on this piece)
- continue to work on more tidy beginning stitches and backtracking over stitches when doing the feathers
- try to find a comfortable speed level for the feathers.
Maybe a bit too much all at once...maybe just a little😜

My rulers worked well, except I did not consider the puffiness and subsequent compaction. First learning! As I did stitch out the inner feathers after the first circle I had enormous problems with the next circle. Yep, pays to think this through a bit. Frame first, and then the filling in of detail!

This looks very much like one that Patsy Thompson had on her blog recently...did not mean to copy, sorry about that, but as I had not pre-planned the arc that I had wanted to do, it did not work out...should have made the inner circle a bit smaller for that, so ended up just doing a normal, straightforward arc around it. Haha...then realized if I wanted to make a channel, I should have stitched the inner arc first, then aligned the ruler and did the channel. Obviously did it the wrong way around and ended up with a tapered channel. Also looks good so I was not too worried about that. Here is a close up of the stitches.

Not too bad at all. I thought that the arcs would be difficult to do, but they went in quite easily. I stitched this with a needle size 14 even though the thread guide says to use a needle size 18. I figured that it probably needs a stronger needle when used on a longarm with high speed, but seeing that I rarely go over speed 20, I thought a smaller size should accommodate the thread just fine. A needle size 18 is just too big for me...I have stitched with a 70/10 or smaller needle on the DSM for the last 5 years or so, so that needle 18 looks like a big nail to me. Had no problem with shredding or breakage and while I feel I am making this up a bit as I go along, it seems to work, so why not.

This has been good fun until I changed to a different colour, but more of that in the next post...

Karin

UFO Sampler

I thought that I had posted about my UFO sampler quilt but now have realized that I put most of the photos on IG!
Anyway, I have been using this as yet another practice ruler quilt and tried just about every ruler that I have on this. The center is finished and I have arrived at the borders. For this, I tried out the Handiquilter Wave ruler.

I have got the 8" wave with a 0.75" and 1.5" depth. Most of my borders end up around 4 -5" and I thought that this would just fit nicely. After a minor struggle to work out the middle of the border (I am so spatially challenged!) putting the wave in was a breeze. Does not really matter if you are slightly off in holding the ruler as it is wavy. This was a bonus. After having stitched the wave, I then shifted the ruler and roughly marked the boundary for the feathers in.

This was easy as and the end result is very neat

Bit hard to see as the batting is not particularly puffy and I used the Aurifil 50/2 thread that just seems to blend in but this is only for practice and to have a bit of a trial to see how this ruler works. I only did the feathers from corner to corner and put a bit of a corner design in as I initially could not work out how to get around the corner, but when I had finished the first feather I saw that I could have taken the feathers into the corner lifting up towards the corner of the quilt and meeting the corresponding feather from the other side. Well, next time...

The real advantage with the ruler is that I only had to think about placement in the beginning. After the first border I could take the ruler and align it on the line that corresponded with the inside of the border (took a note of this!) and off I went. This saved a huge amount of time if I compare it with how I usually would have done it, i.e. used my curvable ruler and drawn it in for every border. Was pretty pleased with this.

Almost done now, so I will post a photo of the entire quilt once it is done.  Some of my handiwork

Actually getting better with the rulers and their alignment...in fact, I am getting a bit addicted to this (as you will see in my next post...). Got so many ideas!

Also, if you have not seen it ...Patsy Thompson will run a Ruler Workshop on her blog in January. Patsy is one of my favourite quilters and visiting her blog the other day I stumbled across this. This sounds like good fun and I will definitely participate. In fact, going over a number of her blog posts about ruler work in general my head was buzzing with inspiration.

Karin