Wrap Up - September 27 '13

Hello and welcome from ThistleFire! So glad you decided to stop by. I'm linked with Leah's site, as usual. I would love to hear your thoughts about my week in fabric.

BKF Throw - This hot mess is finally looking like a quilt! Next, I will add the back, quilt it, and add a dark blue binding binding! I was so excited to find the border fabric. It was exactly what I wanted.

FMQ - Sometimes playing around with practice pieces can develop into something useful. That was the case with my FMQ'ing. I thought I'd play around with having the fabric tell me what it was that it wanted FMQ'd onto it. My material was wild! It has fish on it... and crazy patterns. So I let the FMQ be crazy!

Now the practice panels are eyeglass cases! They will be on my craft show table on October 5th.

OPP - The biggest project that was worked on this week was the challenge quilt. It was coming together nicely and the longarm quilting progressed very nicely. After finishing up the edges, I was able to hand it back over to the owner today. She was absolutely delighted with the results.

The dark blue areas had the big loopy line meandering pattern in a variegated thread.

The star blocks all had outlining in the star and loopy diamonds in the corners.

So, that's about it. I think that's a pretty good week! What's under your needle?

Meandering Butterflies

It was a long arm action night! The fabulous log cabin quilt is getting done!

So, last time, I mentioned that I was going to think about how I would quilt this one.

 

The Scrap Pile

I did some paper piecing tonite. The blue flowers are growing in number!

 

Paper piecing can make a lot of scraps and waste a lot of thread. What can you do with those scraps that pile up but are too big to throw out? Make scrap blocks! 

In between each paper piece line, pull the pattern ahead just enough so you can slip a couple of scraps under the needle. Then sew the scrap pieces together. This will save thread and give you more results when you turn off the machine for the night! And it's fun to dig through the scraps to see what can be saved from the trash! 

As you trim up the edges of your paper pieced lines, set your scraps together according to length and shape. I had short, medium, long, and triangular piles. Then you can start grabbing them to make scrappy "crazy" blocks.

Third One Down

My power sewing weekend has extended into the week but now I can say the three quilts are quilted!

Here's the last one on my list of three - Jen's RITNY quilt getting put on the longarm!

Second One Down

The talented Cathy Kilby is a master Card Trick quilt maker! Here's one that she made with breast cancer awareness fabrics and it needed to be quilted. Loopy Lines is the pattern of choice along with clean, white thread.

 

Here we go! It's getting quilted on the long arm!

 

Long Arm Power Sewing Weekend

There are currently three quilt sandwiches ready to be quilted on the good ol' long arm machine. 

Jen's RITNY quilt. This one has been a labor of love, since it is my pattern.
I can't wait to see it quilted! Not much longer, and it will be!

A Fine Finish

Double Delight is quilted! How exciting! How exhilarating! What a great feeling!!! I'm very pleased with the results. It was a great project from start to finish, even with my tension problems.

Here it is coming off of the long arm.

Tension terror

I am just zipping along on my Double Delight quilt and began to see something wrong developing.

See how the top stitches are loose? This is a clear indication that there is trouble!

Looking at the underside of the quilt shows this mess. Birdnesting. Noooo!!!!

Ok. Breathe. Tension issues has got to be the probably the biggest terror that we face as sewers. Is it the upper or lower tension? It is clear that this one is the lower thread is too tight, pulling the upper thread in too far. I spent a half an hour ripping all this out and went to do some set up research.

I found a really good video on you tube that was very helpful. It was made by a man who sets up long arm machines and teaches people how to use them. That's a reliable source!

First thing - the bobbin was set too tight. Set the loaded case in your hand and pull on the thread. It should not hang in air like this. Jamie explained that on long arm machines, the thread should pull the case up onto its side in your hand and release the thread freely. It should not lift it off the hand.

The large screw on the side of the case adjusts the tension. I turned it counter-clockwise to loosen the tension. Then did the thread pull test until it did what the video described. This adjustment gave the correction in my tension and the stitches began sewing correctly again.

Another problem that can destroy stitches is the way your machine is threaded. This is not correct. Can you see why? The thread is not going through the upper tension discs.

 

Fixing tension is not as much of factor when you are using tabletop machines. Most hobby machines hide the mechanisms, only showing a dial for tension adjustment, making it somewhat mysterious. Changing those settings is frightening! 

 

It does have to be addressed when using different threads and fabrics. Getting an understanding of tension is worth the effort. That way you do not have to feel the terror when your tension goes awry.

Long Arm Free Motion Quilting Marathon

A few months ago, I finished up the Double Delight quilt top (from Quiltville) and am finally getting around to doing the free motion quilting. So excited!!

The long arm machine is the workhorse for this queen sized quilt. As much as I enjoy quilting on my Brother sewing machine, the size of this blanket is a bit much to scrunch into the throat on that machine. I put in a brand new needle, oiled it, picked out and installed my first color of 50 weight Gutterman thread. The quilt frame fit everything with plenty of room to spare. I fussed over the sandwich and admired the set up. Now it's go time! Woo hoo!!!

FMQ Practice - Longarm Machine

My Ringing In The New Year mystery project needed free motion quilting! And this was my tool to do it!