Sunday, September 28, 2008

Preparing to quilt the story quilt



Due to a lack of pink thread, this quilt has been sitting in the corner of the diningroom for several weeks, waiting for me to get it together. The backing and batting are 2-4" larger than the top, pinned away from the seam lines and ready to go!



Always, always, always make a couple of quilt sandwiches of the top fabric, batting, and backing fabric. This allows you to practice a bit o' quilting before getting to the real deal. Check tension, thread choice, and correct needle. Make adjustments and write the information right on these pieces so you'll remember next time: needle size, top thread, bobbin thread, tension setting, etc. Use the exact same batting that is in your quilt. For this quilt I chose Fairfield's Bamboo Batting (50% bamboo, 50% cotton). It has a scrim which means it doesn't have to be quilted to death and it will emerge from the wash without much shrinkage and puckering.



First thing I'm going to do is stitch-in-the-ditch with a walking foot and Presencia 50 wt. 100% cotton thread (color #269) in both the top and bobbin (pictured left). When I move on to free motion quilting with the darning foot, I plan to try out the Mettler 100% cotton variegated pink thread (color #9847) in the top while still using Presencia in the bobbin.


Copyright ©2008, Sharon Baggs

2 comments:

  1. I am going to try to take up quilting... I love Martin's blog so I thought I would check out yours and I love it. You have inspired me to try quilting.

    Charles,
    Boston

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  2. I think the little Hannah twerp has potential for being one of the best quilters ever. Besides me. I love that quilt.

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