:shock: Big quilt....little table! :shock:
Sounds like you've got a good handle on getting it done Heather. Just take it one step at a time. You can do this!

UPDATE --

Well, it's not done (ha!!) but I finally quit stalling, finished all the little things I needed to sew before hand, and finally ran out of excuses so yesterday I pieced the backing fabric together, pieced the batting together, and laid the monster out to baste/etc. Egads, it is huge!!!

But, I finally have a plan, and my sweet husband has said I can take over the dining room table and we can eat on the small patio table (which right now is my "sewing table"; no where near big enough to quilt this thing on!!) until the quilt is done. yay!! That makes things a LOT easier than trying to manage on the little round table.

Here is the plan --
1. ditch work in all vertical and horizontal seams, to stabilize the quilt before I really get to work.
2. outline the comics, start in the middle and work my way out. I will use straight-line, but FMQ so I am not pivoting. I'm confident I can manage that w/o too much trouble.
3. red top thread, outline/echo quilt inside the red bits. Start in the middle, work my way out, again with the straight but FMQ so no pivoting.
4. horizontal straight lines across. I will use one stitch type in the black sections and a different stitch type in the white sections. This way it more looks like the 2 sections are meeting in the middle/interlocking.

Here is where I have a question ---- by this point, the quilt should be pretty stable, and I know to start in the middle (as far as up/down) but can I start at the outside edge, go in until the middle (where the color changes), stop, go back out to the edge (ie, unloading the quilt between times) and basically do all the lines on the black side then adjust the quilt and do the white side?

Or better to start on one edge and go all the way across, just jumping over the middle/switching stitch, and then keep going on the other color? I think jumping over would be easier (then in the end I will go back and do any fill-in that I need to do in that middle section), right?

Then I will figure out border treatment. I think for the pieced border, just long straight lines that follow the edge of the quilt. For the skinny border....probably in reality, same thing, just long lines (maybe use zig zag in there?) but if I get very ambitious maybe I will do my mazey thing inside those. ha! we'll see. By then, I will either be super frustrated and ready to be done, or super confident and excited to try that. -snort!- we'll see.

Gray thread for all except the red parts, but gray in the bobbin the whole time. whew! Wish me luck! Here's the top getting ready to be pinned & basted....huge! and yes, that little white table? that's where I've been sewing. Can you imagine??? So glad DH is letting me take over the dining table instead

I haven't done much hand quilting so am definitely no expert, but generally you try to reduce the bulk as much as possible when quilting by hand. So, if you are planning on stitching right in the ditch, I would assume that you would want to press your seams to one side, away from the side where you will be stitching, so you are only stitching though a single top layer of fabric. If you are quilting 1/4" away from the seam, then it seems like you could press the seams however you want to help with construction.

Hope that helps in some way,

Nancy

mimi62 wrote:
Jimmie, that is one of those things that you will get lots of opinions on! Personally, I think that seams pressed to one side are stronger than if they are pressed open because the only thing holding those seams together is the thread between them.

However, there are times when I also press seams open because I want to reduce the bulk of seams pressed to one side.

Sorry....that isn't much help.

I am in the process of making a quilt with 2 inch half-square traingles. I will be hand quilting it, would it be best to press the seams open or press the seam to one side? Thanks, Jimmie

Thanks all! I think I figured out a beginning idea, so will start with that and see if it makes the quilt look "done" or I need to add more after that or not. Going to settle with horizontal lines across, except then follow a diagonal (the red lines) across the middle, then back to horizontal on the outside. No idea for the borders, I think will do straight mixed with a decorative stitch that goes the same direction as the length of the border. Too many tiny seams in the pieced border to do anything fancy!

The Jacquie Gering blog was a great inspiration, as was your blog, Rosemary! Thanks! Now I'm excited to get started!! I won't start till Wednesday, as we're dog sitting Sat to Tues, but it's nice to have a plan now Yay!

anne1 wrote:

Good photos on Jacquie's blog: http://tallgrassprairiestudio.blogspot.com/

Heather,If you go to Jacquie Gering's web page

http://www.tallgrassprairiestudio.com

and look at some of her blogs you can see quite a lot of her close lines quilting, it's absolutely beautiful.
Love your quilt
Anne

RGold wrote:
I would stress over fmq on a quilt with so much effort, if I wasn't fairly confident. I was blown away by how good Jackie Gering's quilts look. The quilting did not distract from the designs at all.

Oh Yeah - forgot to mention a tip I read in a Sewing for Kids book (bought as a birthday present for friend of DD) suggests that if you have trouble getting the foot pedal to go slow enough try putting/wedging a bit of sponge near the hinge for a bit more resistance, haven't tried it yet but I will be soon (I hope)

If you will slide your EQ printed quilt design into a plastic sleeve protector, you can experiment with your major lines with a dry erase marker and not have to erase pencil lines on the printed paper. It's not so good for fine detail work, but it's great for getting the big picture worked out!

Heather, I'm quilting a (very late) graduation quilt for my niece. It's 56 x 86 inches, regular cotton fabric on top, with wool batting and flannel backing. I have 8-inch blocks with 2-inch sashing. The blocks are mostly just Kaffe Fassett fabric—no piecing within the block, except for 8 blocks where I spell out her name. (I know, I know, y'all want to see photos, but next week, I promise!). I had wanted to do some sort of flower design within the blocks and cable pattern in the sashing, but my skills weren't up to it, plus I really found myself wrestling to get the quilt through my domestic machine. I also could never find quite the right design. I watched one of the Craftsy classes (Ann Peterson's on quilting big quilts in small machines) and got some good tips that way. I even tried a sandwich to practice FMQ—for a first attempt, that actually turned out not too bad, but not good enough to go on her quilt. I'm already so late on getting the quilt to her that I didn't want to take the time to practice FMQ long enough to get good enough at it that I'd be happy with it on her quilt. So finally, I decided on straight lines with my walking foot, and it's turning out nicely. Now that I'm seeing it almost done, I think the straight lines actually are better on the floral fabric than quilted flowers would have been. For the outside borders (a plain Stonehenge fabric), I'm going to use a combination of straight lines and the serpentine stitch—Thank you Jackie Gering for that tip!!!! Anyhow, my advice is that you should do something that will stretch you a bit, but not so far that you will wish you did something else on this quilt. After all, you'll be seeing it often on your son's bed, so you don't want to see it with regret. And remember, done is better than perfect!

Definitely not going to let the planning bog me down; I have some time to figure it out before I can start --- we are dog-sitting a friend's dog this weekend, Saturday to Tuesday, and I will definitely NOT be quilting while Jack is here! He's not so well behaved like my dogs are But Weds morning, out the batting and backing will come and that thing will get sandwiched and basted and off I'll go.

Lois, love the idea you showed of using ironed-on freezer paper templates; genius! I do find it so much easier to follow something when the edge of the foot goes along it, instead of tracing a drawn line as I did when I made my little hearts. Or sandpaper, like Rosemary said; brilliant! I think with tape lines I could do straight lines either way, FMQ or with the walking foot.

I printed out the EQ7 drawing and am doodling on it in pencil to see which idea looks better there, then will decide and go for it. I'll post pictures when I'm done

(afraid this does mean I'll nowhere near get my architectural quilt done; maybe next year!)

Heather, re quilting density being the same across the whole quilt, for the drawings that your son did instead of trying to stitch along the drawn lines fmq you could always do those sections by hand, with running stitch or if you want it too look a bit more like the machine work either backstitch or double running stitch (this would have to be done 'stabbing' rather than 'scooping' to imitate the machine work).

Also another option for templates to stich around - sandpaper works quite nicely, place it grit side down and it hardly moves. Another thing , if you are going to infill by going forwards and backwards in an area (not fmq), instead of pivoting the fabric, how about using the reverse button.... steering is a little bit tricky, but it works fine.

I've been working on my Too Loud Man/Dog Rose 1 quilt this week and it has all been done with a walking foot.[url]forum/everything-else/6118-happy-birthday-rosemary[/url] (click on picture for close-up) I even measured my harp space and came up with 6 1/2", the wadding is an old blanket, and it has been one heck of a wrestling match. Still love it & the design, but the design is definitely one that would have been better handquilted