Heartfelt Wholecloth Progress

Nearing the end of my Heartfelt Wholecloth quilt. This quilt was designed by Kelly Ashton and can be found on the Handiquilter website under the Ruler of the Month Club information.

Only the four corners left

This has been an extraordinary intense workout of all 6 rulers of the Ruler of the Month Club 5 and was an excellent opportunity to get further acquainted with the Capri 18. There are a number of things that I tried on this wholecloth making use of some of the new features, i.e.

- stitch regulation: I used stitch regulation for the the frames of this wholecloth. Making longer straight lines has by now become quite easy to do and I used the Precision mode for this task. As I have become more comfortable with the stitch regulation, I did also use it in some of the smaller designs as well (like all those tiny 1/8in lines, the Flying Geese shapes and the diamonds)). As this was mainly for practice, I did some designs starting off in stitch regulation, however then went back to Manual when this was easier. For example, for some strange reason I found doing the smallish ribbon candy in the last border quite comfortable in Cruise mode on a particular setting where I felt that the machine and I were in sync, however when I tried to do the smaller swirls this did no longer apply. While I could stitch the swirls in Cruise mode, it felt jerky and somewhat uncoordinated. In this instance I went back to Manual, as this was just easier and looked better. A lot more practice needed for stitching some of the smaller designs, although I am equally as happy to just stitch them out using Manual mode . It really is a matter of finding out what feels comfortable for you at what setting and fine tuning this a bit.

- Play/Pause button: I love this feature and have used this on this wholecloth when doing microstippling and pebbling. It allowed me to just concentrate on the movement of my hands, focusing in on the design without starting to slow down or speed up, just keeping the sewing speed at a nice steady speed. Very handy for that sort of work.

Very happy with how things are progressing and looking forward to the next wholecloth. 

Karin

Let's Do Some Ruler Work Linky Party Canned

Hi all

I had a good look at the linky party stats and have decided to close it. It just is not gaining traction, irrespective of whether I advertise it or not. On average it has about 50-100 views on the blog and a high number of people who look at it through instagram, which is great but it does not translate into action. So, maybe I was wrong and the topic is just too specific for people to participate...not sure about that. Could also be that there is just too much going on in cyber space and people are busy with other things. Who knows.

I did want to thank people who have participated over the last few months. It's been an absolute pleasure to read the posts and look at their ruler work. I have really enjoyed this and been inspired by the posts. I am still glad that I have tried this as I have learned a fair bit in the process and would be very comfortable to run a linky again. Maybe inspiration strikes again and I can come up with a more general theme...

Well, back to talking about rulers though. I have had Bethanne Nemesh' Lily Line rulers for about a year by now. Was very excited when I got them, had watched some videos on how to use them, but when I tried to use them it was not that easy. Bethanne makes it look very easy but somehow that did not translate to me. So, they ended up in the drawer for a while.

Lily Line Ruler 1 & 2

Bethanne has been running live videos on FB for the last couple of weeks and while I missed the live sessions I started to watch them (you can find them HERE) on her blog. It finally clicked what I had been doing wrong in terms of using them...I think I was mixing up making marks to align the ruler, i.e. making marks on the quilt and then inconsistently shifting for the 1/4in offset, not marking the ruler correctly etc. While I had seen her use them in her videos before, I think when I used them I got really confused and usually ended up with slightly non-symmetrical shapes. Over the last few days I have been watching the FB videos intently and also gave the last session a bit of a whirl, carefully setting up my marks exactly the way she described it in the videos and 'bingo', it worked like a dream. The videos are excellent not just for learning on how to use those rulers but also on where you might want to use them and how you go about doing this. Really enjoying them. Bethanne is of course a total pro (I had the pleasure of doing a class with her a few years back on feather quilting) and it will take me a long while to get comfortable with the use of these rulers, let alone producing anything remotely as intricate as she does, however I hate to buy things and then not using it. Used correctly, these rulers can save you a lot of time.

Here is my sample

The Sample

Approx. Alignment of Ruler

Don't look too closely at the quilting...this was to test whether I could achieve symmetry freehand, just using a few dots to align the ruler. The top part (the two hearts) was following her example of a block motif that would be repeated over the four quadrants. This came out great, I would just have to do the feathers a bit more carefully...a lovely design for a block. I think all it took was two little dots on the quilt and one mark on the ruler. The two shapes underneath was me trying to use a different part of the ruler, starting from the center out. Interestingly, as soon as I tried to 'wing' it a bit (the left bottom shape), I mucked up the alignment and the feathers were noticeably longer on one side. I did the same shape again, this time going back to making marks on the quilt and ruler and aligning the ruler with the precision hole on one line and it turned out perfect. Lesson learned!

 

So, I made a bit of a pledge to myself to continue to practice with them, trying out different shapes and parts of the rulers that I could use in my wholecloth quilts. Next to practice is Amish Feather curls in borders...love the look of them. Must say, also eyeing out Lily Line 3 now 😏

Karin

Let's Do Some Ruler Work #13

Trying to capture the beauty of the silk I am currently working on, however it is a bugger to photograph (in addition to me not being blessed with great photography skills).

I am nearing the end of my Heartfelt Wholecloth...currently doing the background fillers. Cannot emphasize enough how useful this was in terms of giving a range of rulers such an intense workout. You very quickly get a feel for what rulers you like and which ones are giving you trouble or feel somewhat awkward to use. 

So this is where I am up to, doing some stacked swirls around the grids and filling in the lines with Ribbon Candy. Promptly made a mistake and filled every space with Ribbon Candy...Kelly Ashton from Handiquilter only did every second space...well, too bad, definitely will not undo all that! 

Almost done!

Now to the Linky. Last week we had Rebecca from Cheeky Cognoscenti with some lovely ruler and filler work. Thoroughly enjoyed reading her posts and loved the design she came up with for her HSTs.

 

What are you working on this week? Anything to do with rulers is what we are looking for...it does not matter whether the post is older or a current post of a project you are working on.

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

Karin

Heartfelt Wholecloth Progress

Working steadily away on the Heartfelt Wholecloth, a project that came out of the Handiquilter Ruler of the Month Club 5.

After finishing the frame and doing the grids I was ready to fill in the center

Center filled in with pebbles and some freehand straight line work

Did some more straight lines around the hearts which was easy enough. Now came the hard part...lots of tiny lines with the HQ Matchstick Ruler (1/8in) all around the odd shaped Flying Geese. That looked like a real hassle and involved an extraordinary amount of travelling along previously stitched lines. When I started off I did single lines, travelling back over wherever I landed. I soon discovered that this was not the way to go about this as I sometimes had to travel along the Flying Geese, sometimes at the bottom and sometimes on the top wavy line which prevented me from working out a way to systematically stitch this out. In the end I decided to double-stitch the lines (which for me is literally unheard off), i.e. down and up again, travelling only on the upper wavy line to the next spot, leaving some areas uncovered. Came back to these uncovered areas on the second path, travelling on the lower wavy line. This probably does not make a lot of sense, but suffice to say, this was a hassle and a half and took a while to complete.

I finally completed that part and am happy to report that the world did not come to an end because of the double-stitched lines, in fact I can hardly see it. The whole piece is looking more and more like the real thing

After this I filled in the last lot of spaces with some more circles and now I only have to do some piano keys in the wavy sections (on the right above) and then 'only' need to do some background fillers to complete the wholecloth.

Its looking lovely...not entirely correct in some places but the psychedelic silk is making up for that.

I must say that this is the way to go with the Ruler of the Month Clubs, i.e. stitching out a project to go with those particular rulers. I have used every one of the rulers intensely plus a few others (circles and straight line rulers) and it does help you to really become familiar with the rulers in terms of holding them, whether you need more or less grip in places and using multiple parts of the same ruler. Really enjoying this (when I am not cursing about those tiny lines) and learning a lot.

Not that I want to advertise, but there is a Ruler of the Month Club 6 out which also has a project attached to it. That one looks way simpler...I think it is a great way to get your confidence up with rulers. I am not doing the Ruler of the Month Club 6 as I really have enough rulers for the time being. Famous last words...already wondering whether there will be a number 7.

Karin

Let's Do Some Ruler Work #12

Last week, Rosemary from The Knitting Quilter linked up with some straight line quilting in a border

How good does this look. Always like straight lines...so effective!

I have been working away on my Heartfelt Wholecloth. Certainly is giving me a major workout with all the rulers of the Handiquilter Ruler of the Month Club 5. The only thing I do not like about this is that there are lots of starts and stops and unlike the longarmers, I bury my threads, so this is a bit of work. Completed the frame some time last week. Had to let go of one of the additional borders as my silk piece was not big enough. This does not really stand out as it is well structured with several borders, so one less does not matter at all.

Heartfelt Wholecloth frame (approx. 44in)

Then started on the filling of all of those little and not so little spaces. Today I was working on grids and promptly got that wrong

The left is correct, the right has the ruler the wrong way around on the second path, i.e. following the curve in the opposing way. I was ever so careful to get this right and initially could not work out what happened other then that it looked somewhat weird. The correct grid is stitched on the diagonal following the curves of the arc. I used the new Curved Crosshatching Ruler for that and once I worked it all out, this was no problem at all. 

So, this is where I am up, still lots to do

 Time to link up what you have been working on with rulers.

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

Karin

Let's Do Some Ruler Work #11

I have this piece of silk that I was saving for something, not sure what, so it has been sitting around in my stash for some years by now. The problem with silk for me is the marking, still not entirely sure what people use, however I finally put it to good use, stitching out the Heartfelt Wholecloth Quilt  designed by Kelly Ashton using all the rulers of the Handiquilter Ruler of the Month Club 5 (as this meant minimal marking). No better way to get used to some of these rulers then to use them in an actual project. I ended up marking the silk with a fine chalk pencil, thinking that this was going to come off with some heat...not sure how I got mixed up but that is actually not the case, so I am going to have these lines in there. Hopefully they will be quilted over or rub off with time. If worst comes to worst, I will have to wash this thing when it is finished.

So I made a start with the Double Heart Ruler and promptly had to do it again as my hearts kept overlapping which I did not like. Found the ruler quite challenging actually as it is just that little bit chunky. Also was using the stitch regulator for some practice which added some difficulty, however I got there in the end. The silk itself is very forgiving which surprised me a bit. Really enjoying stitching on silk (using Aurifil 50/2 thread in a coordinating colour).

So far, so good, except there were no measurements in the instructions, so I felt that I was doing this a bit blind. I was supposed to stitch another hexagon around the center going from circle to circle and initially my hexagon was going to end up somewhat misshapen. Had to improvise a bit and make it fit to  come out with an accurate hexagon shape.

This has taken most of the day. Managed to get the hexagon around the center and then tackled the wavy line. You can see above some of the rulers used so far (from left to right: Half Carat Diamond Ruler, Double Heart Ruler and the Wavy Line Ruler). I was dreading the wavy line a bit because I already knew it would not fit neatly into my space. I usually draw out my wholecloth quilts so that I can work out how things fit into spaces as I am not really good at just winging it. Must say this was an excellent exercise for me and I finally 'got it', i.e. how to assess in a roundabout way how this was going to fit and then, while going along, ever so slightly shifting the ruler over to make up that 1/4in that I needed to keep the corners approximately the same. Then I echoed around it which was surprisingly easy, although I went at absolute snail pace to get that right.

A close up of my handiwork

Not exact by any means but workable. Really enjoying the challenge. 

Here is another photo of the psychodelic silk. It shimmers all sorts of colours..this probably comes closest to what it actually looks like.

Now it is time for the Linky. Would be great to see what other people are working on with rulers. If you are currently working on something that involves rulers or have an old post, please consider sharing. 

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

Karin

Finishing A Quilt On The HQ Capri18

I am so happy and relieved that the new machine arrived. I had not realized how much I was used to having the capability of these machines to make my life easier in terms of finishing off a quilt. 

I thought I do a little post about how I go about finishing a quilt

I usually pin-baste my quilts which takes an enormous amount of time as I have to take it easy otherwise I do in my back! Once that is done, depending on what I have in mind for the quilt, I baste my quilt with the basting function. Now this new model has more basting options than the Sweet 16.  It's got 5 different settings in the 'manual basting mode', i.e. the machine does a stitch every 0.5 sec, 0.75 secs, 1.0 secs, 1.5 secs and 2.0 secs. On top of that, there are 4 different basting stitch options in the regulated mode, i.e 0.5in, 1in, 2in and 4in baste. I used the non-regulated basting option at 0.5 secs, i.e. the machine does a stitch every 0.5 secs. Very smooth on this machine. I think I probably would use the regulated mode if I was to look at basting a grid, but for this little quilt I just meander basted all over it to be able to take the pins out (as I was going to use a ruler and the pins would have been forever in the way presenting a bit of a hazard if you are not careful).

This is what that looks like...did not even bother with the pins, just noodled around them as I had good visibility...once done, I take them all out again and  am almost ready to quilt.

0.5sec Basting Stitch

Lastly, I secure the edges of the quilt also using the 0.5 sec basting stitch, but this time using the help of the trusted Versa tool to keep it nice and straight, stitching about 1/8in from the edge. For some reason I prefer the Versa tool for this job above all others...maybe because it is a bit wider, hence easy to hold and it keeps the edge of the quilt very flat while I go around the perimeter of the quilt. Handiquilter has brought out a square foot last year which could be used for this as well, but I must say I do prefer doing this with the ruler.

Then I obviously go ahead and quilt the quilt, in this case I tried out the Multi Clamshell ruler to stitch some spirals across the quilt as outlined in previous posts. Once done with this I also attached the binding on this machine, again using the Versa tool. Obviously this is a smaller lap sized quilt and I had no problem with the bulk of the quilt as I have the extension flaps on either side. This works really well for me and bonus I can use the ruler to make the stitching stop exactly 1/4in from the edge of the quilt with that little notch at the end of the straight part of the Versa tool, something which always ends up a bit sloppy when I am doing this on the DSM.

Seems a bit long-winded but having to do some of this on the DSM the last few months really showed me how much I had become used to the convenience of these machines. It is making the job so much easier and quicker!

Karin