Memorial Day 2013

Source: Uploaded by user via Roz on Pinterest

Thinking of all our heroes today. God bless the fallen and comfort their families.

Virtual Quilter

Actually, I'm a sick and distracted quilter who has been spending too much time on the internet! But look what I did! I'm learning an Illustrator-like program called Inkscape. I'm feeling very aware of how much there is to learn when it comes to computers, computer graphics, design and writing. Somehow that's dangerously close to feeling stupid! But I'm learning all kinds of new stuff so I've got to be doing something right, somehow.

If my brain can figure out how to do this, why can't it remember to buy toilet paper?

There's just not enough quilty goodness going on this week. I've got a cold and there's a ton of yard work to be done. I'm itching to stitch!!!!

My "Gone Quilting" Badge: Scissors on my Shirt!

One of my favorite tools for quilting and sewing is a pair of small curved bladed scissors along with a 'zinger' or retractable holder. I use the scissors for cutting threads and the zinger keeps me from losing them. Or at least if I am actually wearing it. With different classes, stitch nights and such, I can't find them but I recently found a replacement at a bargain!

I found these scissors and 'retractable badge holder' at Walmart! The zinger was in the jewelry section and the scissors were in the sewing department. The zinger was a mere $2.88!

 The scissors say nothing on the package about having curved tips, but they caught my eye anyway. I made a fair spectacle of myself trying to look inside the packaging to see if they were in fact curved, damaged, or judge if the view was distorted by the packaging. They aren't curved as much as I would like, but for $3.97 (I think), they will do nicely! Much more budget friendly than the $20 or so I paid for my lost pair. The curved tips help cut the threads close to the top, but with less risk of cutting the fabric.

And the zinger is pretty! I actually had to look amongst many styles to find one that didn't have, in my opinion, too much bling. There it is keeping the other butterflies company! (I didn't even realize I had a butterfly thing going on until I loaded this photo.)

One of the best things about this combination though is that the kids have learned to see the combo on my shirt as a badge that says "Mom's working". Or at least that's the theory. It works better with the older two than with this cutie below!

What's he hiding under that container? It's not his beautiful golden curls....sob. He got a short summer cut and I'm still missing those curls a bit. He is still too stinkin' cute though!

How to Free Motion Quilt: The Basic Motion and Tension

You're all set up and ready to go, right? If you have questions about setting up, see the first post: How to Free Motion Quilt: The Set Up.

Quilt Sandwich

First you need something to practice on. Do yourself a favor and don't start quilting on a project that needs quilting. Use a practice piece. I keep several practice pieces to warm up on before doing good quilts. Don't skimp on this step, use material and batting similar to what you normally use for quilted projects. A  top piece, backing and batting. This is a good time to use colors or prints that you are no longer crazy about. If the print is very wild, use the wrong side out so you can see your stitches better.

Batting

A word about batting; if you use a very thin batting, you will have more tension issues than if you use a slightly thicker batt with more room for the interlocking part of the stitch to stay inside the sandwich. I like an 80% cotton/20% polyester batting because it shows the quilting texture better without being too thick and puffy. For those who want to use 100% cotton, battings can be found in thicker lofts. Don't go too thick! The thicker and bigger the quilt sandwich, the harder to move it. For a practice piece though, you really only need somewhere between 12 to 24 inches square.

Thread Thoughts

Use a middle weight thread, or even regular sewing thread to start out with. My favorite is Glide by Filtec, a trilobal polyester embroidery thread. It's available in a ton of colors, strong and truly lint free. It's a shiny thread, which I love for my fmq and decorative stitching. If you are a cotton purist, make sure you have a high quality thread like Aurifil or Filtec's Cairo Quilt for the best strength and less lint.  Cotton breaks easier than poly, so you might want to start with poly. Pick a color that you can see clearly on your fabric but remember that when quilting for real, you most likely would use a matching thread so those bobbles that stand out so much in contrasting thread will be a lot harder to see. 

Before You Start

Basic motion before tension: Since jerky movements can contribute to tension problems (and thread breaks), we're going to start with basic motion before perfecting the tension. If you have never done any (or very little) free motion quilting, do everything below except take the thread out of the machine!

You read that right. Set up your sandwich, foot, gloves, machine settings, etc. like you were going to quilt, but don't use any thread (bottom or top) and start quilting. Just get used to the motion of your hands in a circular motion, back and forth, smoothly. Listen to the sound of the machine and vary the speed. Using a topstitch 90/14 needle should let you see the holes a little bit and takes away some of the fear of tension settings, snarls, and mess ups.

Once you're comfortable moving about without thread, it's time to thread the machine.

Make sure your FMQ or darning foot is lowered! Since the foot 'floats' above the surface when the needle is up, it is easy to forget to lower the foot before stitching. That will create a snarl of thread for certain. (Guess how I know this?)

Pull up the bobbin thread: Hold onto the top thread and lower the needle down and back up. Give the tail of the top thread a tug to pull a loop of the bobbin thread up and pull the loop to bring the tail of bobbin thread to the top. You may need to raise the presser foot in order to grab the thread; this is when a knee lift system is wonderful. Hold both tails as you begin to quilt so they don't get sucked back under the quilt and make a snarl.

If you have a needle down feature on your machine, go ahead and set it to be down.

Motion

With your tension settings on automatic (if you have an automatic tension) or pretty much where they'd be if piecing, place your hands on either side of the needle, with your thumbs and index fingers making a circular or triangular shape about 5 inches wide. Begin making circular motions with your hands while pressing slowly on the foot pedal. I do not recommend the 'pedal to the metal' fast quilting. It makes me panicky. Vary the speed of your hands and machine until your stitches are fairly even. Pay attention to the sound of your machine when in this 'sweet spot'. If you have a speed slider, you can slow the top speed down so that if you 'floor it', the machine won't go too fast for your hands. Make some swirls and loops.

Repositioning your hands: You will need to reposition your hands when the motion brings either hand close to the needle. Stop with the needle down before you move your hands. This will keep the piece from moving as much when you move your hands. Don't walk your hands to reposition while the machine is still running.

Tension

By now it's time to think about thread tension. Have you already had a snarl? Hopefully not. Pull the piece out of the machine and take a look at the top and bottom side. (You'll need to raise the needle and lift the presser foot.) Pick a spot near the stitching and using a marker, write the tension setting number down right on the fabric. Make sure the presser foot is up before adjusting the tension! Remember, when using similar weights of thread in the top and bobbin, and you're not using a specialty thread, you should only need to adjust the TOP tension.

Here's a video of my tension adjusting process:

You can also see in this photo some needle holes from stitching without thread.

Top thread is being pulled to the underside (Which is the most common tension issue.), tighten the top tension to a higher number.

Does your free-motion quilting pull in the curves? In the picture above, those little eyelashes on the loops are a perfect example of changes in speed or uneven movement of hands throwing off the tension. Especially in curves, the hands tend to go faster, causing just enough abrupt change in the tension on the thread to cause slight eye-lashing. Slow your hands down just a bit in curves. Don't whip them out.

 Pretty close to perfect tension above and below.

Adjust the tension a little at a time and check frequently. I use my practice piece to record the tension adjustments, usually going from very loose (3 on my machine) to a setting that's too tight (a 6.5 or 7 for me) and then pick the best tensioned area and set my machine on that setting. See the video How To Free Motion Quilt; Tension Adjustments to see how I check my tension.

Vary your speed to see if it affects the tension. Iffy tension will show itself the most in curves. Some motions need more speed than others. I do not go very fast, but more speed is needed when doing curves to keep them smooth, because the hands tend to speed up. I find that if I am pulling my quilt directly towards myself, the needle can pierce the thread in mid-stitch formation causing it to shred or break. So I try to make sure I don't do that. Just a tiny angle to either side solves the issue.

Your tension may need adjusting with every different thread combination. Tension that works on regular quilting cottons might need to be adjusted when stitching on batiks.

Some newer, higher end machines have auto tension. I can't speak to other brands, but I find that the Janome auto tension adjusts pretty well. Some times it needs to be put to manual or adjusted in the settings if you are using a different thread in the top and bottom or if you still have abrupt changes in your hand motion.

Janome sells a special bobbin case for free motion quilting, sometimes refered to as the blue dot bobbin case. This has a lower tension to help avoid eyelashes on the back. Some people swear by it. I prefer to adjust my tension myself when needed instead of changing the bobbin case.

It takes time and practice to get your hands and foot control working together and learning how your machine responds. Every machine responds differently and of course, every single stitcher is as unique as the stars in the sky! You have to find what works for YOU!

Next in the series: Free Motion Quilting Designs. I'll show some designs that work in several different kinds of quilts. I hope you have found this series useful so far. Please leave a comment if you've got a question or a comment.