I took a class through Craftsy, outfitted my machine with a special ruler foot, got a few rulers, and tried it out. It helps that I just happen to have 2 quilts in need of quilting ...
Patsy Thompson offers a review of the class here by Amy Johnson, with a link to sign up, if you're interested.
It's not hard, if you take your time. Once you get used to the idea of placing the ruler 1/4 - 1/2 away from where you want the stitching to go, it makes a big difference. I've been doing free-motion quilting for years, but sometimes you want more precise and straight lines, instead of the "hand-drawn" look.
Here's the egg carton pattern. I've used this in the past with a template (plastic or cardboard).
Minimal marking, too! The only thing I marked was the midpoint of the sashing block(with my new Crayola washable markers, which I tested for washability--so much cheaper than any of the official quilting marking tools).
I stitched in the ditch down one edge of the block (for stability). Then I ran a curved edge from a corner to the opposite midpoint. Easy-peasy!
Re-position and repeat until all 4 lines of the block are stitched.
Then I ran down the other long edge (again for stability).
It's a small enough block that I can turn a much smaller section of the quilt (as opposed to the whole thing) to get things lined up properly.
Still need to work out something for the borders, but quite please with the way this turned out!
I love to learn something new. ;-)
I'm including this photo just because I love the way the quilting thread shows up on the fabrics.
1 comment:
I saw this demonstrated in an on-line video and thought - yeah - for all the reasons you've mentioned. I know that long-arm quilters have been using this method for a long time because they absolutely hate stitch in the ditch and straight lines, but these rulers solved the issue of free-motioning without the waiver. I was pretty excited that someone thought to remember us domestic machine users.
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