That's how many safety pins I've used to baste the Winding Ways quilt. And it really isn't very big. I am NOT going to repeat the mistake of not basting well for machine quilting this quilt!I starched the backing and top heavily when ironing. I pinned the backing down TAUT. And I pinned the top along the sides too. (Working on a carpet here. I didn't have anywhere to tape it all down.) I could not find adhesive spray for the batting in the local craft store (though I've located it on a Japanese website). And since I had JUST bought a whole bolt of polyester batting, 25 meters worth, I decided to work with this (and pin well!) instead of going hunting for cotton batting which I don't even know if I've ever seen in Japan...
Machine quilting will begin! I'm planning to use the walking foot for some of the circles but I'm wondering what to do for fill-in in other places. And the border. The border is pretty plain and probably needs something but I don't want to take the eye from the lovely natural streaking in the dye...
7 comments:
Good luck on your machine quilting this time! :}
I hope it goes much smoother for you this time. Since you capitalized the word TAUT, I am hoping that you didn't pull the backing too taut - it should be flat. If the back is more taut than the front, it could cause problems. I would do a quality inspection - just turn the quilt over, and make sure it looks smooth from the back as well as the front before I start quilting.
That should be enough pins! Hope all goes well. :)
Best of luck! I agree with Shasta as well! Not too taut.
Lurking Linda
Have you ever tryed large clamps that they sell at the office supply store? They come in a box of 12. Layer the quilt on a large table such as ping pong or on table whatever the size of quilt. First clamp backing taut, then batting and finally the top making as taut as the backing. While clamped pin baste with 1 inch brass safety pins no farther apart than the width of your fist.
Then Lower the feed dogs on your machine and remove the foot and quilt freehand with only the needle. Somewhat scary at first but you will get used to it.
See if that helps.
I Enjoy your blog!
Tanya....I think by now you've had as many suggestions as you have friends (I sent my suggestions by email!). The best advise I can give you is to do it. Take the advise given and do what you can/want to do. Then if that doesn't work just adjust and try again. Machine quilting takes practice. Just as your hand quilting wasn't perfect in the beginning, your stitches got smaller and better with practice. Have fun.
Hope it goes more smoothly for you this time...sounds like you did everything "right". What about stitching in the ditch of the horizontal and vertical seam lines, then quilting all the circular lines of the wonderful winding ways pattern right out into the border (even where there are no blocks just continue it on)?
You could also quilting a 1/4" seam line just inside of the circular pattern. Hope this makes sense!
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