Jill’s Year of the Pig Question #8 is —
What part (or parts) of the process of making a quilt are your least favorite? The part (or parts) that you just dread and that make you throw your projects back into the dark recesses of your stash closet? Have you found any tricks to break the cycle of being held up on the parts that aren’t your favorite?
This question got me thinking. Is there any part of making a quilt that I dread?
It’s not the binding. Once I get a quilt quilted, I want to get it bound. I don’t sew the binding down by hand, so that is probably why this doesn’t bother me.
I used to hate sandwiching the quilt. It’s hard on the knees crawling around on the floor. But I’ve figured out how to get it done on my big board ironing board (I generally make twin size quilts or smaller these days).
One could argue that I must not like the process of quilting itself. Putting stitches through the three layers which makes the quilt top a quilt. I say this because I have around 40 quilt tops waiting to be quilted – three from September of 2006.
It’s not that I don’t like this step, it’s more a case of not knowing what to quilt on a top. Until last fall, all of my quilting was done on my sewing machine. I’ve tried free motion quilting and I need more practice, but don’t want to do it on my “good” tops and mess them up. So, I’ve been limited to straight line quilting and soft curves — especially on anything bigger than about 40″ square.
But last fall I discovered Rocking Chair Quilts in Butler, Missouri rents time on their longarm. It’s an hours drive, but well worth the time. My oldest completed top was from 2005. I think it was 96″ square — no way for me to get it done on my sewing machine and not “good enough” to pay someone to quilt it. I took it down to Butler and quilted it in an afternoon. It won’t win awards, but that’s not why I quilt.
Hard and fast deadlines also get me going. I’ve got a stack of 5 quilts w/backing fabric which need to be quilted by the middle of June. All of them have been waiting to be quilted for at least a year or more. A couple I’ll quilt here at home and a couple I’ll take down to Butler. I have a rough idea of how I’m going to quilt at least 4 of them. The fifth one is giving me fits, but I’ll figure something out.
Click over to Jill’s to see how others get past their least favorite part of quilting.
Sounds like you found a way to make some of the UFO stagnation go away.
That’s a great way to get your quilts done! Good luck with the 5 you’re working on for June.
I took the long are class last fall and have done up one baby quilt but really want to try a little free motion but agree knowing what to do is hard