Rhonda Bracey: At Random

I finished the last of the latest batch of 10 community quilts today.

I had quite a bit of difficulty deciding how to quilt this quilt as there was a lot going on in it. Eventually, I decided to stitch in the ditch along the diagonals of the coloured areas hoping that I’d get inspiration for the rest of the quilt. After doing that, I was still stumped! So I decided to emphasise a small element of the quilt — the cream vertical bars. Again, I stitched in the ditch, extending the stitching from one vertical bar to the next (I used my Line Tamer ruler to stitch all these straight lines — using this ruler is much quicker for me than trying to stitch straight lines on the Sweet Sixteen without it).

Once I’d done the vertical lines, I figured that that was enough quilting for the main quilt top. The last stage was to quilt the ‘white space’ in the border around the appliqued flowers. I decided on a leaf motif (with loops), in keeping with the floral theme in the border. I continued using the same thread I’d used for the rest of the quilt.

Threads used:

• Top: Fil-Tec Glide, cream (colour 20001; 40 wt)
• Bobbin: Rheingold Bobbinfil (by Madeira) (white, 70 wt)

Click on a photo to view it larger.

A quilt entirely made of scrappy strips…. And fabric scraps from many of the past five or more decades too, I think! I suspect that some of these fabrics were from the 1940s or 50s. Others were definitely from the 60s and 70s, while still others were likely from the 80s and 90s. I’m not sure there were many/any fabrics in this quilt top that were more recent than the 1990s!

As an example, the yellow, blue and pink fabric strip in this photo is likely a fabric from the 40s or 50s, and the others surrounding it are probably from the 60s or 70s, while the really bright crocodile/hippo one is likely from the 80s or 90s (click on a photo to see it larger):

And there was no order to how these strips were put together — lights were with other lights, or mediums, or darks…; colours were placed at random; and fabric styles were also random. Viewed as a whole, this quilt is actually quite nice, but up close it didn’t do much for me 😉

How to quilt it? I was tempted to take the easy way out and do any all-over design like open headbands or a large meandering stipple. But then I wondered how I’d tackle the black border. So I decided to emphasise the strips.

I started from approximately the middle and using my Line Tamer ruler I stitched out to the edge, stitching in the ditch as far as possible (some strips were wonky, so I did the best I could). When I got to the edge of the strips, I lined up the ruler with the black border’s seam to make sure I stitched out ot the edge perpendicular to the seam. I repeated this for each seam for some 10 or so strips. I then turned the quilt around and ditch stitched the other side of those stitching lines from the middle out.

Then I went back to the middle and started the strips on the other side of the centre, stitching from the middle about halfway along the length of a strip out to the edge of the border. Again, I did about 10 or so strips, then turned the quilt around and did the opposite side of those half-done stitching lines.

And kept on until I reached the top and bottom edges of the quilt.

Then I came back and started again in the middle, this time stitching a centre line between each of the stitching lines I’d already created. This resulted in a parallel stitching line about every 1/2 to 3/4 inch apart.

The effect I was looking for was a ‘modern quilt‘ look. Many ‘modern quilts’ that I’ve seen in magazines and on the internet use a lot of parallel straight stitching and very geometric squares, rectangles, etc. — I thought parallel stitching it would be an interesting effect with these old fabrics.

I was pleased with the final result. When the stitching only followed the seams, there was something missing. Adding the lines of stitching between the seams fixed that. I was pleased with how it turned out.

Threads used:

• Top: Fil-Tec Harmony variegated pastels — yellow, pink, blue, and green (40 wt cotton; colour ‘Spring’ #14062)
• Bobbin: charcoal Wonderfil Deco-Bob (80 wt; colour DB 122)

This was a very detailed applique quilt — someone had spent many hours making it. And I spent many hours quilting it! (I suspect about 10 hours in total).

I started with the centerpiece by echo quilting the words, then I used tight McTavishing to fill in the rest of the background of this centre, thus ‘popping’ the appliqued flowers (click on a photo to view it larger)

I stippled the background of the remainder of the applique sections, with a tight small stippling stitch, again to ‘pop’ the appliqued elements.

For the star blocks, I used a few different elements. I wanted to try out the spiral design from the November Free Motion Quilting Challenge, so there are quite a few spirals in these star blocks 😉

I stitched all the cream areas with Superior Threads’ King Tut “Papyrus” (colour 972), and used the same bobbin throughout (Deco Bob DB 115).

I decided not to quilt the sashing as there was already a lot of quilting on this quilt. However, the borders needed to be stablised, so I quilted a continuous run of spirals in them using Isacord thread (colour 4133). However, I didn’t take a photo as these spirals were almost impossible to see against the teal floral fabric.

The finished quilt:

This was just a small (42 x 42 inch) quilt. It was pretty busy with all those pinwheels, so I decided to follow the straight lines and extend them through the pinwheels. That left some quite large empty blue squares, so I did a freehand diamond spiral in them.

I can’t remember what threads I used for this one! But I think it was a plain mid-to-dark blue for all the stitching on the top of the quilt. And yes, I used a ruler for all those straight lines — my favourite Line Tamer ruler.

Click on a photo to view it larger.

Like quilt #29, this one was also ‘busy’ but with nowhere near so many colours as that other quilt, and nowhere near as big either!

Again, I decided to do a simple all-over motif, this time a large meandering stipple. I left the borders free, then after I’d done the stippling, I decided to quilt some of my favourite bird feathers in them.

I used the same thread set-up as that for quilt #29. As with that quilt, the thread blended beautifully with all the colours in the quilt and in the brown borders. I like the effect the variegated thread has on the feathers. (I like the rhythm of these feathers so much that I was motoring along at 70% speed when I was doing them 😉

Threads used:

• Top: Fil-Tec Harmony (‘Pistachio’ — colour 14066; 40 wt? cotton)
• Bobbin: Wonderful Deco-Bob (80 wt, colour DB 115)

Click on a photo to view it larger.

This is the biggest quilt I think I’ve quilted on my Sweet Sixteen, so I had both wings of the table extended, and even then the quilt wanted to drop off the edges at times.

It was such a busy quilt and with heaps of colours (someone emptied her scrap bin?) in the nine-patch squares that I decided to do a simple all-over motif. And guess what? I went back to my favourite ‘open headband‘ again 😉

I used a thread I have only used once before, a variegated cotton in tans, greens, and golds. The thread blended beautifully with all the colours in the quilt, but boy, it leaves a LOT of lint and fluff, including in the top tension disks. I had to clean the machine’s tension disks, needle area, and bobbin case regularly with this thread. It snapped a couple of times, but not enough to make me not want to use it.

Threads used:

• Top: Fil-Tec Harmony (‘Pistachio’ — colour 14066; 40 wt? cotton)
• Bobbin: Wonderful Deco-Bob (80 wt, colour DB 115)

Click on a photo to view it larger.

The last of the four quilts I quilted this weekend was another appliqued quilt, this time with a theme of angels. Like the bunny quilt, this one had panels where the applique was the most important element, and I wanted to make these appliqued angels ‘pop’. But I was a bit over stippling! So this time I decided to do some McTavishing. If I thought small stippling took a long time, then McTavishing blew that out of the park — it takes MUCH longer. I think it probably took about six or more hours to quilt this quilt.

For those who don’t know what McTavishing is, it’s the flame-like quilting I did in the applique panels. It’s a technique that was developed/promoted by long-arm quilter, Karen McTavish.

I left the borders unquilted as I felt that this quilt didn’t need any further quilting! However, I did ‘stitch in the ditch’ around the blue star fabric border, just to stabilise this area.

Threads used:

• Top: Superior King Tut ‘Papyrus’ (color #972), 40 wt (?) cotton
• Bobbin: Wonderfil Deco -Bob, 80 wt, color DB 205 (pale pink)

Click on a photo to view it larger.

The next quilt in the batch I quilted this weekend was a fun one! Cute little bunnies were appliqued all around the quilt, and the bright sunny yellow sets off the applique work of the maker really well. The child who is likely to receive this quilt will love it, I’m sure.

To make the appliqued objects ‘pop’, particularly in the centre panels, I quilted with a quite tight stipple (not a micro stipple, but not a large stipple either). I used a larger stipple on cream border panels, and a large leaf motif on the yellow outer border. All that small stippling meant that this quilt took several hours to quilt.

I tried to ignore the spelling errors…

Threads used:

• Top: Superior King Tut ‘Papyrus’ (color #972), 40 wt (?) cotton (the cream thread); Isacord, 40 wt polyester, color 0506 (yellow)
• Bobbin: Wonderfil Deco-Bob, 80 wt, color DB 115

Click on a photo to view it larger.

As I already had the thread loaded up for Community Quilt #25, I went straight on to this one as the colours were similar. This was a much smaller quilt (42 x 42 inches I think), so it didn’t take too long to quilt, especially as I used another favourite allover quilting motif — the one I call ‘open headbands‘. This meant I didn’t have to think a lot and could go faster than usual (I think I had the speed set to 60% for this one). I’m glad I kept the lighter bobbin thread in for this one as I think it adds a lot of ‘texture’ to the back.

Threads used:

• Top: Superior Rainbows variegated thread in a blue, reddish tan and cream; 40 wt, color 814
• Bobbin: Wonderfil Deco-Bob pale gray thread; 80 wt, color DB 103

Click on a photo to view it larger.

I had a bit of a quilting binge this past weekend! The weather was pleasantly cool, which meant I could venture into the sewing room (summers here are cruel). I don’t know how long I’ll be able to do that for, so I’m trying to get as many community quilts quilted as I can before the heat of summer really sets in and it become too hot to quilt (ambient temperature plus the heat of a quilt sitting on your lap…).

I was able to get four of the latest batch of my community quilts quilted. I think I’ve got my system worked out now — it worked well for this weekend, anyhow. I ironed the backing and top while watching TV, then pin basted the quilt on the wide kitchen counter still while watching TV (the TV is on the other side of the family room and I have a good view of it when I need to look up). I then roll the quilt up and put it in the sewing room, ready for quilting. Repeat for the other quilts. I’ve only got enough quilting pins to do about four largish quilts. But ironing and pin basting a batch like this (while watching TV) meant that when it came time to quilt I didn’t have to lose an hour or more PER QUILT doing those tasks. It also meant I got some TV programs I’d recorded ‘watched’. In fact, I ‘watched’ the whole 2.5 hours of the movie, “Angela’s Ashes” plus another two hour-long shows, while doing the ironing and basting. Sitting just watching TV always seems like such a waste of time, so combining time like this was a good move!

The first quilt of this latest batch was a large lap (single bed?) quilt, in blues and reds. It was already a pretty ‘busy’ quilt, so I just did a large allover stipple on it. Because I can stipple quite well these days ( my first efforts five years ago looked like jagged brain coral!), I set my HQ Sweet Sixteen to 70% speed (yes, that’s fast for me — I normally quilt about 35% speed) and off I went. A couple of hours later and this quilt was done.

Threads used:

• Top: Superior Rainbows variegated thread in a blue, reddish tan and cream; 40 wt, color 814
• Bobbin: Wonderfil Deco-Bob pale gray thread; 80 wt, color DB 103

Click on a photo to view it larger.