Simply Done
I teach quilting on a midarm machine whenever I can and at the Valdez Quilt Festival I was invited to teach this class twice. I really enjoy showing quilters why I love this system more than the longarm 🙂
I’ve owned both a longarm and midarm system and quilted on the home sewing machine as well, so I try to give the students a full perspective on all three but the class really is about using one of these new, quilt friendly, frame quilting machines. Here’s a pic from my Thursday class.
Whenever Sarah does a demonstration of our Crazy Shortcut Quilt techniques she mentions “stitch envy”. It happens during class when the students are quilting their squares using the decorative stitches of their sewing machines. They look at the quilters next to them and the stitches they have on their machines, and well, you get the idea.
We teach a lot of ways to get the most from your machine no matter how many stitches it has and I’ve quilted on machines with just 5 or 6 stitches – changing width and stitch length just to get some variety.
Today I got an email from a really cool lady who couldn’t wait to show me what she’d stitched up after reading our book. “We inspired her” she said, “and be sure to look at that crown stitch” she said. So I looked at her photos and now I have stitch envy!
She has crowns!
I want crowns!
Look at those stitches. I am so broke that I just couldn’t ask what machine she has – – I’m afraid to ask! LOL I’ll be dreaming of stitches tonight….thanks to Sandra Wucher of the Stashbusters Group on Yahoo!
I just love having a cutting table that I can stand at and walk around! Sarah gave me this table and I use it all the time. The other thing that I really like is the pegboard that hangs next to it. I have the table shoved into a corner (no wobbling) and my rulers, rotary cutters and scissors hang from it along with a comfortable mish mash of stuff . My mess, take a peek.
That cute quilt on the wall is, I believe, the first quilt Sarah ever made…isn’t that sweet! She gave it to me!
I can hardly believe my eyes, but I have a bobbin disaster. I am using a bobbin thread (new brand) and it is blowing out the sides of my bobbins. All of the bobbins in the photo used to be the same size before I loaded on this thread! I have a stand alone bobbin winder that I have used for years (even when longarming, so it has seen plenty of use) and I’ve used bobbin thread for years (a different brand) but I’ve never seen anything like this before! Yikes!
I did get a decent bobbin wound by using the winder on the sewing machine, and don’t ask me how or why it worked because I have no idea. I wound the thread off the bobbin you see to the far right in the photo – and this is what was left on it after the other bobbin was full.
I am, at times, overwhelmed with what is available for free on the internet. Squidoo is interesting to me because they give you a nicely formatted place to share information on subjects that you are passionate about – and they give you a choice of donating any profits from the page you create to charity.
I am pretty passionate about some aspects of quilting and I like to share information for free and I am a firm believer in helping others. Squidoo.com looks like a good fit for me. Unlike a blog, where after about a week a post is lost in Label/Archive limbo – my topic is always there, easy to find and always available for anyone looking for it. That’s kind of neat 🙂
If you are passionate about a subject and you want to share it with the internet world, head on over there and create what they call a ‘lens’. Here’s mine on different machine quilting systems.
I was having a heck of a time with my decorative stitching and thread backlash in the bobbin. I thought it was the thread (no) the stitch (no) and finally just assumed that the timing was off on the sewing machine (no).
I can’t say I know what caused the problem, but I do know what backlash is: bobbin thread whipping backwards in the bobbin case & either bunching up or creating huge globs of thread clusters on the back of the fabric or quilt or winding itself onto the bobbin spring and shredding.
I had read a while ago about a teflon ring that was being sold as a ‘cure’ for backlash and in desperation, I cut a corner off my teflon pressing sheet and trimmed it to fit the bobbin case and guess what? No more backlash and I have been happily stitching ever since! Now, cutting up the pressing pad was an act of desperation – the teflon rings are available at quilt shops and online at Keepsake Quilting. But, if you’re desperate for a solution and don’t want to wait…….
I just love anything that makes my sewing and quilting easier, and these 2 things do exactly that: Joan Hawley’s Tips DVD and Prym-Dritz curved nickel pins in a size 1.
The first time I saw Joan at Quilt Market, with her booth & business sign that said “Lazy Girl” I stopped in my tracks. Here was a woman I could relate to! I watched her Tips DVD yesterday and it renewed my respect for Joan and my love of her tips. This DVD is mostly about zippers (she uses them in quite remarkable ways on several of her handbag patterns). Lots of sewers are afraid of zippers and Joan removes all the stupid rules I learned in home-ec, back when girls had to take home economics and girls had to wear skirts and dresses to public school (I’m old!). Joan’s DVD shows how to put in zippers faster than putting on a binding, and easier too.
While I was watching the DVD I was also doing the boring task of pinning my squares for a new quilt. 
I had a few bad pins and I opened up a brand new package of Prym Pins. Heaven. Bad pins are worse than useless (into the scrap bin they went) because they pull at the fabric and distort the smoothness I worked so hard to get! These new pins were smooooooth and sweet and between them and watching Joan, made a boring task better.
BTW, if you like the background fabric on the pins photo, it’s Cherrywoods hand dyed fabric from their ‘Chestnut to Light’ colorway. That’s what I am working on now.
As with my custom quilting desk I’ve improvised my cutting and pressing tables & surfaces. Here are the things I use and like, and why. This table (Sam’s Club $42) has 3 height settings, so I can sew on it (sitting down) or stand comfortably and cut fabrics 
and battings at it’s tallest setting of 36″ high.
On the table you see my rotary cutter and my 20½” square ruler made by Omni. I just love this for cutting my quilt-as-you-go squares and for cutting batting squares.
I use this gripper stuff 
after trying several other brands and I just love it! 
(Walmart) I use it under my laptop, under cutting pads and under the wooden pressing
surface that I improvised with a piece of plywood with Warm & Natural batting and muslin fabric. {Lowe’s used to carry these smaller pieces of wood in bins in the plywood aisle, or you can buy a sheet of plywood and have them make the cuts for you}.
I just put the piece of gripper on the bare ironing board surface and then place the wood on it and cover it with cotton batting and then muslin.
Don’t be afraid to improvise to make your sewing and quilting easier. I like the wood board because it is slightly larger than a fat quarter of fabric (18″x22″).
I am going to do the Martha Stewart thing and post a few of my favorite (machine quilting) things. I’ve been machine quilting (home machine, longarm & midarm) for 13 yrs and have been teaching for about 10 yrs. I’ve used a lot of products over the years and I have developed some specific preferences. I am preparing to teach tomorrow and that brought this list to mind:
I love Warm & Natural batting for MQ – it’s flat and slightly stiff and that keeps it from bunching up when I’m trying to quilt. When washed it makes a nice soft quilt. I only use Sulky clear polyester for SID. The most important tool to keep nearby is a tiny screwdriver to change bobbin tension with and the cheapest one you can buy comes in an eyeglass repair kit. I love my Machingers Quilting Gloves – they are light, they let my skin breathe and the grippy tips are superb.
A flat surface is a must and you can build an area around your machine with many things. I’ve used heavy cardboard boxes with glossy surfaces and now I have my home-made dream desk and I wouldn’t trade it for anything. (How to build it here). Good lighting is a must and it’s cheap too. I buy 4′ long florescent hanging fixtures (shop lights) and I put daylight rated bulbs in them. I have 2 of these hanging over my sewing area. You can see them in this pic.
My daughter and co-author, Sarah Raffuse, has started a blog. Hehehehehe. I knew that if I stole her pictures enough she’d start blogging herself 🙂 <—-happy mom smile!
On her post today she shows off one of her most favorite quilts, made with the Bella Nonna pattern and silk flowers (check out their stuff here). Their patterns are cute, cute, cute! And they are nice people, we always say hi & chat at Quilt Market.
So stop on by Sarah Raffuse’s Blog and say hi or just take a peek!
