curved feathers

This post is to help Sue with curved feathers or anybody else for that matter. I would post this in the tip section, but I don't have the ability to post there. So if Wendy or Joanne wants to more this there, I am fine with that. Anyway, When you do a inside curved feather you have to modify the base of the feather so that they are slightly wider and change the angel of the top of the feather more to the center of the inside curve. Some people will do a wonky type of feather in doing curved feathers to avoid the long skinny feathers in the curved area. In doing the wonky type you scoop the top out into the blank area and then do a smaller feather to close up the space then do a another feather normally. Always remember to start the feather from the spine with a 45 degree angel where the feather starts its little curve. I hope this makes sense and not to muddy, if anybody wants I will try to clarify more later. Here are a couple of pictures to help, sorry of the poor resolution I took them with my phone.

Cheryl M.
myneedleandthread.blogspot.com

Day 14 for Cheryl

When I started this challenge I was not sure if I could do all 14 days in a row. I am happy to say that a personal goal of doing it, with a little of a challenge to rearrange sewing things. The piecing was little to almost none with the machine set up with FMQ.  Wanting a separate machine to just FMQ is more wanted than ever. Day 14 was a busy day but I did manage to squeeze in a 30 minute timeframe of FMQ to do another sample block. This one was inspired by a Joan and Joanne’s samples of feathers and fill stitches. It’s not as good as I would like it to be, but it will do for a sample piece for now.

Thanks for a wonderful challenge Joanne and Wendy. When and if you have another one, I will be happy to join in, this was a fun time.

Cheryl M.

Day 11, 12, and 13 little at a time!

All most there for me. I have had some internet problems for the last couple of days, so I was not able to post results. Everything is back to normal now.

I am still working on my daughters  graduation quilt. It is about 1/3 of the way done. It is slow going with the pebbling and echoing around the letters and words. I have to go slower than I normally do otherwise I will break a needle if  I hit the seam areas the wrong way. That was last Wednesday, day 11 for me.
On Thursday (day12) and today (day 13) I decided to take a break from the quilt and work on some class samples. I had no samples of what FMQ looks like with 100 wt. silk and 50 wt. cotton next to each other.

The smaller picture is the same as the top left corner block area. all four sections of the picture on the right was done with 100 wt. YLI silk on top, embroidery bobbin thread in the bobbin. The batting was 80/20 Fairfield sewn with a 70 Microtel needle. These were a dream to quilt and some of the areas you can see are done on the dense side, and they are very soft to the touch with no stiffness in the fabric and batting.

This last picture shows 100 wt. silk on the left and 50 wt. cotton Gutermann on the right. Though you really can not see much difference in the picture, you can see in real. The 50 wt. thread lays more on the top of the fabric, where the 100 wt. silk melts into the fabric and almost become part of the fabric.
One more day for me and that will make 14 days. Though I tell my students all the time that you have to practice daily to see the results, I am always amazed by the improvements that I make when I quilt on a daily basis. I just wish I had the time to quilt more. But a little thing like work gets in the way. LOL

Day 9 and 10 short to the point.

Just want to chime in to say that I am still on a slow process forward on my FMQing. I have only been able to find a couple of 15 minutes time frames to quilt on my DD quilt for day 9 and day 10 for my consecutive days. I am a 1/4 of the way done with the red swirls feathers. I am somewhat surprised that it is going faster than I expected. I might have this done sometime this weekend. I won't post any pictures for they will be somewhat the same as I post earlier. When I finish I will for sure post a pic of when finished.
Cheryl M.

A long day 8

    

It has been a long time since I spent most of a day sewing or quilting. I have been in sewing heaven all day. I started out by changing the thread on the machine to water soluble thread to do some trapunto on a geisha panel that I wanted to do, followed by some FMQ fills and accents. All I have left is look for some olive green thread to do a very small section in the lower corner and then I can block this piece and bind it. One done and 3 more to do.

Cheryl M.

Day 6 and Day 7 from Cheryl

I seem to only be able to grab a 15 –30 minutes time frame each day, but at least it’s something. Thanks Wendy and Joanne for the challenge, it was just what I needed to jump start the FMQ again. Here is what I have been doing for the my day 6 and day 7.

For day 6 I finally figured out the swirl design for my daughter’s quilt. It was staring right at me in one of the fabrics in the quilt.

It’s a  feather design with swirly curls for the feathers. I wanted to quilt the red blocks in red and the only red thread that I had left was a spool of invisfil 100 wt. poly.

So I did one small area and it was a dream of a thread to work with, It melted into the fabric and showed very little wobble in the back tracking areas. The small area that is next to the swirl feather is about 1/2” wide by 1”  long. The invisfil thread is so fine that you can get very detail in the spacing and control of your movements. If you ever get a chance to work with this thread, do try you will be amazed by the control you can have.

On day 7 I started quilting the red blocks in DD quilt, going slow and that is OK. I mark each 3” block with a pilot frixion pen just enough to see. It might take me the next 7 days to do this quilt, at least I will have been working on it and not folded up in the corner. One thing that I noticed about this design is that every now and then the swirls form a heart shape, fitting for who the quilt is going to.

Cheryl M.

Day 4 and 5 from Cheryl

Have not been able to do much FMQ the last couple of days. Had to teach a quilting class on Wednesday night and meeting last night. Stole a 15 minutes of time to doodle on some muslin to try to figure not a pattern for my DD graduation quilt. I think I am getting closer, but not sure how to get the swirling pattern to flow the way I want them to go.
Day 4

Day 5
Cheryl M.

Day 3 for Me (Cheryl)

You would think that after 3 years of having a project laying around getting in my way most of the time, you would think that I would have a plan on how I want to quilt my daughters graduation quilt.

But the truth is that all I have come up with to quilt this is to stipple it. I really don’t want something that is simple for something special for her.  The photos will not have any quilting on them ( the black out areas) and the words are machine embroidered. 

So  today I am playing with some fill stitches to hope that something will come to me. If any body has any suggestions please chime in or comment (please, pretty please).

Cheryl M.

Day 2 one FMQ project done :)

Well I have been FMQ in between visiting with my in-laws. It feels so good to go into the sewing room and quilt for about 5-10 minutes. This little 12” project just needs squaring up and binding put on it.

I don’t know what the next FMQ project will be, I will look and think about that tomorrow after my guest have left and things get back to normal.
Till later Cheryl

Day 1 for Cheryl

I was planning on starting the FMQ on Friday night or Saturday, but when I got home on Friday. My husband and I had a welcoming surprise from his parents. They decided to drive down from Indiana for a quick visit. So the entire  weekend was very enjoyable visiting with them and having my children and grandchildren in and out of the house. It’s a good thing the date was changed, otherwise I would have started out not being able to get all 14 days in.
I did get a few minutes last night around 9 to throw the watercolor piece into a quilt sandwich and start the FMQ on it. I wanted to start out with something that I could just play with thread and check the tension. To feel the machine hum, it had been last September since I did any quilting. It felt so good to be stitch again, even though it was late at night, I did not want to stop.

Cheryl’s FMQ PLAN:

I am really looking forward to this challenge, thanks Joanne and Wendy for starting it. I hope to get a few small projects done and maybe a larger one that I have put off for about three years now. I really want to finish the graduation quilt that I did for my daughter; she only graduated four years ago. I seem to always start other projects that seem to need starting before I can finish the last one.

The first one is a sample that I did for a class that I taught where you use watercolors and paint the picture on fabric. This is somewhat new to me and I like the idea of getting into the artistic side of quilting.

The next project is a fabric panel that I found at one of the LQS that I want to do a quilted wall hanging for my bedroom. Last year I redecorated my room to have an Asian theme to it and the space above the headboard is too small for a regular picture but too large to leave blank. So I will cut these up to four small quilts and hang them next to each other.

The third project is the quilt that I started for my daughter for her graduation; I got the top done the day before she graduated and was not able to quilt it.  It’s one of those things that I put off and never get back to it unless I force myself to finish.

Cheryl M.