First, of course, it’s summer and I want to be busy doing other summer-y things and going places. I don’t know if you’re like me or not, but I tend to quilt less in the summer months. Here’s hoping we all have a productive autumn season - especially with our quilting. Happy Thursday to you! Leaf Background Image by on Freepik Skipping the batting makes my fleece-backed throw quilts very cozy and super floppy - which I love! Have you ever tried machine quilting with fleece on the back of your quilt?Ī friend of mine, Cheryl, who is a free motion long arm quilter, took my quilting on fleece idea even further - she layers 2 pieces of fleece and free motion quilts them together to make a one of a kind textured throw blanket. Be aware that I don’t put batting in my fleece-backed throw quilts. There is nothing like curling up with a fleece-backed quilt. Boy, they didn’t know what they were missing! Of course, back then, folks kind of looked at me funny when I showed off my free motion quilted quilts backed with fleece. I guess I was ahead of my time a little bit. I began free motion quilting on fleece long before even Minky was popular as a quilt backing. Today I have a fun little video for you with some great tips for free motion quilting a quilt top backed with fleece fabric (you know - the fleece you make tied blankies with or comfy pj pants out of?). Helmer image from Ikea Free Motion Quilting on Fleece My drawer unit is the Helmer unit from Ikea. And yes, the top drawer even has my collection of variegated threads. Now I have a small six drawer unit on wheels with all my spools of thread organized by color or type. This was when I moved back to working with solid 100% cotton threads. Then it kind of looked like I skipped part of the quilting design. The only real problem I found working with those yummy variegated threads was that sometimes I lost the thread on the quilt because the thread color matched the quilt exactly. WOW! What fun it was quilting with variegated thread! I grabbed up every variegated thread spool I found, which was especially fun when I went on shop hops and quilting bus trips with my quilty pals. Then I discovered King Tut variegated thread by Superior Threads. I experimented with different threads and manufacturers for a while to see what I liked the best, or maybe more accurately what threads my sewing machine liked the best. And I was hooked!Īfter I had some quilts under my belt and I upgraded to a little better sewing machine where I could actually drop the feed dogs - it had a needle-down function too, I switched to using the same thread I pieced with - 100% cotton. And don’t forget that fishing line (today’s invisible thread is so so much better than back then)! Regardless of the challenges, I kept free motion quilting. The invisible thread back then was like thin fishing line - yuck! But I still slogged through - learning how to free motion quilt with a basic sewing machine on which I had to cover the feed dogs with tape or an index card because the feed dogs didn’t drop. Of course, back then free motion quilting was frowned upon and free motion quilters tried for a hand quilted look by using invisible monofilament thread to hide their machine stitching. I was a new enough quilter that I wasn’t afraid to try it. LOL!Įventually I heard about a relatively newfangled thing called free motion quilting (FMQ). I did try a little hand quilting on my very first quilt, which I lovingly call “Big Ugly”, but my stitches were so big, I could’ve probably caught my toe in them. Of course, first I tried to “stitch in the ditch” but I found I couldn’t manage to actually stay in the ditch. I started machine quilting right after I learned to do patchwork almost 25 years ago. Do you quilt your own quilts or do you send them out to a long arm quilter? If you do your own quilting, do you hand or machine quilt? My Machine Quilting Journey I’m sew excited you stopped by today! After doing those fall quilt tutorials a few weeks ago, I am trying to now get them all quilted before I dive into making more quilt tops (my projects seem to be multiplying daily).
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